


Transmission One : Abduction

by Ravwrin_NataEl



Series: Transmissions [1]
Category: Invader Zim
Genre: Action/Adventure, F/M, Romance, Science Fiction & Fantasy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-12
Updated: 2014-03-05
Packaged: 2018-01-12 01:33:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 12
Words: 27,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1180328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ravwrin_NataEl/pseuds/Ravwrin_NataEl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two high school students find out there is life beyond the stars the hard way when their high school is abducted and they are stuck on a slave ship.  After finding a way to escape, they find themselves on a living ship and a whole other mess of trouble.  Will these two ever find their way home or will the universe keep throwing things in their path.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Abduction

**Author's Note:**

> Words – Chapter title, point of view chance, important info.
> 
> Words – Thoughts
> 
> (Words) – Bez speak
> 
> Words – Regular speech and the story.

**Chapter 1 –The Abduction—**

* * *

 

**Somewhere in the galaxy.....**

* * *

 

The tides in space were shifting as something came awake.  An over whelming feeling was washing through the invisible waves created by the the movement of the planets and stars.  Little would the small planet, third from it's sun, know what was coming or what would happen the the months or years to come.

To think, this all started with a ship and a plan to take a few things from the planet.  Because everyone in the galaxy who knew this little planet, knew that the creatures were simple beings who only had the basic of the basics with space flight and technology.  So they would cause no trouble when taken and seemed easy to break and train for the uses anyone wished for.  And no one would miss this small imature species.

The time was now, the plan simple.  Get in, get out and take as many was they could and try to keep getting as many of the race as they could without damaging the product.  No one wanted damaged goods.

* * *

 

**Somewhere in a cell on a ship....**

* * *

 

Ruby red eyes looked around their cell and the owner sighed heavily with a desolate look in those strong eyes.  Stuck in this cell with nothing to even look forward to.  His empire didn't even want him and there was no way they would waste the time to try and save him.  At this rate he should just give up.

But that is something Zim wasn't going to worry about at the moment.  Giving up wasn't in his blood.  He would tell himself that he was buying his time till he could escape.  That this was only a little hiccup in his plans.  Whatever they were.

The squeal of his companion brought him out of his dark thoughts and he scowled at the little monstrosity hanging from the bars of their cell.  A suffering sigh came from his lips this time.  How he had been stuck with such a deranged robot was beyond him.

“Lookit!  I’ma monkie!!!! Whooooohohohe!”

“GIR if you do no remove yourself from those bars I will dismantle you myself!”

“But master!  I’m a monkey!”

“I don’t care!  Get down or else!” he shouted shaking his fist at the little robot.

“Awwwww…..” the little robot sighed as he slid down the bars to fall on his head with a slight clang.  He walked over to a corner of the cell and sat pouting.

Just great, he was getting the silent treatment.  It wouldn’t last long he knew but at least it gave him more time to think about his situation.  Not that that line of thought was pleasant at all.

* * *

 

  
**Time Date:** 10:00 A.M. last day of school

  
**Place** : HHS High School Gym (9,10,11,12th grades have to fit)

  
**For** : Assembly

* * *

 

**Wren’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

It was ten a.m. on a freaking Friday the last day of school.  We have been sitting here  since seven this morning.  Nothing was happening but it was the most boring thing in the world for us as we sat in the gym waiting for the day to end.  And of course, the end of the day wasn't going to come until three because our school system was one of the stupidest in the state, probably the whole country.

Rachel and I were sitting on the gym floor listening to some senior talk about how much the school has changed and about our education is important for our future. She continued then to talk about the next year. Personally I didn't care about the next year because we were not going to be there seeing as we had already graduated from the blasted school.  So by this time I made a hand puppet and made it talk almost in sync with the senior. Rachel shot me a deadly glare and hit me sharply in the arm. I returned the glared but perked up as the senior concluded her speech.  That was only to  sigh heavily when another senior took the first's place.  They were even more monotone that the first had been.

I leaned over to Rachel and whispered, "Can this get any more boring? My butt is falling asleep. And I'm hungry.”

“Shut up and stop complaining. At least we’re not working on the last day of school like they seem to do every year,” she replied as she took a notebook from her bag and beamed me over the head.

"Screw the last day of school," I muttered and rubbed the sore spot on my head. "Why do we have to listen to another damn senior when we are seniors ourselves? And why the hell do we have to sit on the floor? Can't we just kick some damn little underclassman off the bleachers? And why in the hell did they make it mandatory that all seniors stay till the end of the school year?"

Rachel hit me with her notebook again, but just a little harder. "Will you just shut up" she hissed dangerously. "You'll get us in trouble.  I don’t want to be in trouble the last bloody day."

“It's not like they can actually do anything about it you know.  We have our whatevers so technically they can't keep us here.”

Another whack across my head had me scowling at her.

“ _I hate that notebook_.” I thought with another glare at her. I rubbed the spot on my head that she hit. “ _She seems to always hit the same spot twice too. Maybe I’ll burn it if I get a chance_.” I smiled as I daydreamed of it bursting into flames or roasting it over a fire.

Suddenly I started to giggle with no reason. I mean, I usually sometimes giggle without a reason but this one began in the back of my throat only to burst through my mouth quite differently than my usual giggles.  My eyes widened and I was shocked at what was going on but I couldn't stop giggling.  I covered my mouth with my hands but that didn’t help at all to stop the giggles.  Biting my lip I thought that would help, but the giggling overrode the pain much to my despair.

Rachel looked at me and Shanon did too, startled at the sudden noise that bubbled from my throat. Then Shanon started to laugh softly and her boyfriend started to laugh too. Rachel started several minutes after staring at the three of us like we were some insane psychopaths or that we had inhaled several hallucinogenic drugs. The others around us were looking at us with the same look that Rachel had held before she started laughing. Then suddenly all of the people around us started in on the laughter one by one, sometimes in pairs.

“What is going on here? Stop laughing, have some courtesy for your fellow students,” the principle shouted standing from where she had sat.

The laughter rippled around the gym, escalating to an almost roar. She shouted and tried her hardest to stop the laughter that was running amok in the room.  But after she said the last of her words she started to laugh too.

Everyone throughout the whole gym started to laugh so hard they had to hold their sides. A few were even in tears and several had fallen onto the floor unable to catch their breathes. I was wondering the whole time what made us do this when I saw a faint shadow of a thick gas float across the floor.

It was a pale pink color then it was slowly followed by a black smoke or fog. The wisps curled around and created figures on the floor.  I seemed to be the only one who noticed it.  And it made sense why I was affected before anyone else.  Rachel and I were sitting on the floor where no one else was sitting. And I was the closest to a door as well.

Rachel and I started to cough as the darker smoke reached up and passed by our faces.  I tried to scramble to get up while trying to stop laughing and coughing all together. Others started coughing as well as it swept by them. Soon the whole gym was in a fit of coughing and panic settled in.  I saw people try to scramble for the doors but were unsuccessful in getting them open.  Students were dropping to the ground one by one and some in groups.  

My vision began to grow fuzzy around the edges and things started to grow dark. I only remember hitting the floor as my sense of balance was totally lost and my last thought was that we were going to all die. Someone had tried to kill our whole school.

* * *

 

**Hours later….**

* * *

 

**Location.... Unknown....**

* * *

 

I shivered as I slowly woke up.  My senses laced with pain as they told me that someone had elbowed me in the stomach pretty hard. I would have cursed if my mouth wouldn't have been so dry and my tongue sticking to the roof on my mouth.

“Ughhhhhh,” I moaned as I tried getting up. I fell over and met the floor again with nausea and a pounding headache. I could have sworn that I didn't remember sticking my head under a damn jackhammer before waking up or even before passing out.

 Someone moaned beside of me. They tried to sit up and fell over also so I wasn’t the only feeling the way I did.  I didn't feel so bad now knowing it wasn't just me either.

I kept my eyes closed to see if that would stop the hammering in my head but my head hurt so much that I didn't think it would ever go away anytime soon.  I tried to listen to my surroundings but all I could hear anything but the pounding in my head. So I was shit out of luck with that sense, but my sense of touch and smell worked just fine enough. I could feel vibrations through the floor which confirmed the touch notion and I could smell a musty smell around me. The smell of unwashed bodies also as hit me along with sweat and something I just didn’t know what it was.  And I probably didn't want to know what it was that I was smelling to be truthful.

Soon though, my head cleared up enough that I could hear somewhat better without the ringing in my ears or the annoyed pounding in my head.  I tried to move and found my arm under somebody else this time.  Probably the person who had tried to get up after myself only to collapse like I did.  I moved again but froze when I heard voices that we’re quite human.  More guttural and primal than anything could produce from Earth.   And they were moving closer to where I was.

“Greth falin toraar gosha.” A deep voice said.  I could barely make out through whatever was blocking them from me.

“Rackor noff talick.” Another replied.

“ _What type of language is that? It is definitely not human_.” I thought to myself. I tried sitting up again and successfully freed my arm from under the body of the person beside me. The pounding of my head had quieted to a dull thrum.  I found that there was a wall behind me with a wandering hand and scooted to lean against it for support. The cool metal feeling welcomed against my warm body.

“Grafash tocar. Naotdack far motkt hesh.” One of the voices continued.

“Portca mas torfa?” one replied with what sounded like amusement or something as close to amusement as I could tell.

I suddenly let out a yelp when something brushed against my side. I felt a pressure of something leaning against me and I flinched away from it unsure of what it could be in this darkness.

“Shhhhhhhh,” someone said as they put a hand over my mouth quickly. “You don’t want them to hear us do you?” A familiar voice asked in a whisper beside my ear.

I pulled the hand off of my mouth and whispered back, “Rachel? What are we doing here? Why are we here? Why is it so dark? What are they saying? Is anyone else here? What are they…?”

Rachel put her hand over my mouth again and replied, “Do you want to alert them faster?  I have no clue to any of that. But I think we are the only ones awake at this point of time.  Or at least able to move at all.  I think.”

She paused to see if she could hear anything else coming from where the voices were.

“Do you have anything broken or wrong with you?” Rachel asked after a pause to listen for any more voices.

“Nothing except a slight headache and some sore ribs,” I replied. “You?”

“Maybe a sprained wrist from where someone having landed on it or something like that.  And the headache that I think is common with what they used to knock us out.”

“You know,” I said after some silence between the both of us, “This might be a bad time to mention that I have to go.”

“Go where?” Rachel asked a little confused.

“I’ve got to go, as in to the bathroom,” I muttered in reply.

“Yeah it might be a bad time to mention that,” Rachel said confirming it. That caused us to giggle just a little.

Apparently that laughter was just enough to alert whatever it was outside that we were awake.  Both of us froze as we heard the voices speak up.

“Defgrash! Refty sorta af masha!” A shouting voice demanded.

“Efta ssssirrr. Yosl fory ri modge.” Replied another and footsteps were heard running toward us.

A thin line of light appeared on the wall across from us and it grew wider in the shape of a door. Two shadows appeared in the light and soon the two figures had appeared.

"I guess I figured out the reason why I couldn't see." I muttered and shielded my eyes against the light.

“You think?” Rachel muttered to me as she did the same.


	2. Awake at Last

 

 

**Chapter 2 –Awake at Last—**

* * *

 

**Wren’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

Rachel and I were blinded by a sudden brilliant flash as the door opened fully. Clicking footsteps came closer to us as we squinted at the figures in front of us despite the light. Though at first all we could see were vague outlines of what the beasts could be.

As the forms got closer we had to strain our necks to even look at them.  We both looked up and saw creatures that must have been seven or eight feet tall. We still couldn’t see the descriptions very clear because our eyes weren't adjusted to the light. I looked at Rachel and mouthed, 'Uh oh.'

“Cafrat gecar marto!” an authoritative voice demanded from behind the two forms in front of us.

Hands grasped both my upper arms and pulled upward.  I was lifted three feet off the floor then they heaved me up. It was almost like I weighed nothing. They muttered something to each other and started to move. I looked over my shoulder and saw that Rachel was being carried along behind me the same way by two of the same creatures. We were swinging just a little as they carried us toward the exit.

She was doing the same as I was, just hanging there but with a scowl of pure hatred on her face. I giggled at that. It was kinda funny. The being abducted by aliens part. Too bad they probably were going to eat us.  Or use us for some weird sort of experiments.  I personally would have preferred neither if it could be helped.  Experiments and being eaten were not on my agenda.

We continued down a corridor and turned to our right. Quite a few turns later we finally paused at a door way.  There were so many turns my head started to spin. Whether that was because we being carried though unknown territory or because of leftover drugging was anyone’s guess.

One of my guards swiped his hand across one of the panels and the door opened.

Inside there were more of the same creatures. By now my eyes had adjusted to the harsh light of what could only be a ship of course.  My eyes darted across them all and a full outline of them reminded me of something.  Something I had either seen or thought of before.   Some of their colors were green and brown and others blue and brown. They had golden colored reptile like eyes and thin wirery bodies. The arms and legs were long and ended with three fingers and toes.  There were blades on their elbows and forearms too.  Adorning their long, almost vulture like faces were blades as well.  Tails finished of the long and tall look but these had a blade about a foot and a half long on them.

I was still looking around at them when the guards suddenly threw me on a table. Landing hard I yelped and hissed as pain shot through my back and spine. I heard Rachel cuss as she was thrown on a table behind me.

One of the creatures from the room looked at our guards and scowled sharply.

“Yourf fantid rep kam quarick.” Another said as it push the guards out the door obviously quite miffed at how they were treating us.

More voices came in reply as it pushed them out. Then all attention turned to us.

Their golden eyes searched us as if trying to find the answer to all their questions.

“ _This cannot be good_.” I thought.

Their stares were then directed to the things that were in front of them. No attention was on us so I finally got a count of six or seven aliens in the room.  I still couldn't place where I had seen the likes of these aliens but it was bothering the hell out of me.  It was right on the tip of my tongue but wasn't coming out.  Like the name of a class mate or a person you know but you just can't recall.

My attention suddenly focused onto a single alien when one of the figures turned toward me with something in its hand. It was a glint of silver in it's four clawed hand.  The object was like one of the future syringes(1) seen on the odd space shows on tv. But this, this thing had a needle visible on the end of it which had to be at least three inches long.

I took one look at that needle and screamed bloody murder. Needless to say, the reason for the scream was because I'm terrified of needles.  Needles were a big no no in my dictionary and vocabulary.  I mean, I get queasy when someone on tv get's stuck with a needle.  And here they were coming at me with something that I knew I didn't want to get stuck with. 

All eyes turned on me startled.  They had never, in all their years of research and practicing their jobs probably heard something as high pitched and sudden as my scream.  By now they were probably trying to figure out how to shut me up.

* * *

 

**Narrator….**

* * *

 

**Slave holding cells….**

* * *

 

Almost every head in the cell block shot up and looked about at the shrill sound that echoed through the halls.  Zim’s antenna’s perked at the sound and he found himself confused as he tried to place what exactly could make a sound that high.

The Meekrob couldn’t make that high of a frequency screech. None of the other species he knew of could make a sound that high either.  None that he’s seen from his cell either.   So whatever did make that sound, he didn’t feel sorry for it.  Better that being than him.  He was just thankful he understood the language of the aliens that captured him or it could have been much worse for him.

And from what he had seen of the aliens that had been carted to and from, from this last batch, they couldn’t possibly make such sounds.  He knew that the new aliens they were bringing on were brittle and dumb.  They didn’t last at all, many only overnight.  And they were so pale and fragile that they looked like they would break if you even looked at them wrong.

Zim huffed and reclined on his bed, looking at the bottom of the cot above him.  How was he going to make it through this?  What was he going to be sold for or worse?  What was going to be tested on him next?  He had to get out of here even if it meant destroying the whole ship to get out safe.  Could he escape on his own though?  Were his chances that good?

Probably not.  The universe seemed to have it out for him lately.  Along with his Tallests.  It seemed like a giant galactic ‘KICK ME’ sign was flashing above his head.  He also assumed it’d been there for a while with how much crap had been happening to him lately.

Zim rolled over onto his side and curled into himself a little.  He didn’t quite like these thoughts running around his head now.  He knew he wasn’t as great as he wanted to be, but was he really so low on the cosmic pole that he deserved this?  He looked as his hand, clenching and unclenching his fist, the material of his glove making a barely noticeable squeak.  Maybe he was as defective as the others thought.  Look at the mess he was in. None of the other Invaders would have been caged this easily.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (1) Kinda like those scifi syringes you see all the time. Like on Star Trek... please tell me you guys know Star Trek.....


	3. Med Lab

**Chapter 3 –Med Lab—**

* * *

 

**Narrator....**

* * *

 

Zim paused in a sudden round of strangling GIR who just squealed happily at the attention after he startled him half to death from his melancholy pity fest.  Several other aliens in other cells paused as well as another scream echoed through the halls.  He wandered if that same alien was getting tortured still.  He knew a few of the aliens in this hall had something done to them that drastically altered them.  He hoped that that poor being that was getting tortured didn't have to suffer to the end.

“Yay!  Torture!” GIR giggled madly startling Zim out of his thoughts once again.

“Shut up GIR!” Zim snarled before throwing the unit to the side.  He could feel a migraine coming on as he slid down the bars of his cell rubbing his temples.  He had to get out of here before this got too much worse. He couldn’t take more of this.

* * *

 

 

**Wren’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

 

I started another bout of screaming as soon as I saw the needle get closer. Two of the creatures grabbed my arms and held me still as I tried to get away. The first alien with the needle came closer and I just struggled harder trying to kick out at it.  My breathing grew rapid and frantic as I felt a panic attack coming on.  Fear lacing through every nerve of my body as I struggled even harder to get loose of their grip.  I was mildly pleased through everything when I finally was able to land a kick to the gut of one of the scientists almost making it double over in pain.  Suddenly one of the ones holding me grabbed a fist full of my hair and jerked my head back exposing my neck to the one of them.

Next thing I knew the needle pressed against my skin and then into my neck. I could feel the fluid run through my veins with an icy bite.  It slowly traveled through my system and I could feel it numbing my body. They let me go seeing as I stopped struggling and I sat there dazed for a while.

The one that injected me gave me a look then spoke directly at me.  “Gryant oveg noiv?”

I blinked at it and frowned. “What?”

The aliens looked disappointed for some odd reason and started talking to each other.

“Yoi grafash dowta. Mabyr yort shoulnd ave usedt aa larggrrr dose?” one of them said.

I looked at them a little confused. “ _I could have sworn that I understood the second part of what they said,_ ” I thought to myself. “ _I have to be imagining things tough.  I couldn’t have understood them._ ”  I looked back at Rachel who was sitting there watching me nervously.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“Would you be okay if they stuck you with a fucking needle?” I asked with a snarl coming out of my daze slightly.

“Don’t start with me. I’m next. And then we both will be in the same situation.” She replied in the same tone.

“Well at least maybe something might happen to you. I feel like nothing changed.” I said as I crossed my arms in front of me. “Nothing ever happens to me. Why can't something cool happen?”

“Will you shut up and quit complaining. Because if you don’t I’m going to smack you.”

“Will not.” I replied like an eight year old.

“Will too.”

“Will not.”

“Too.”

“Not.”

“Too!”

“Not!”

“TOO!”

“NOT!”

Rachel suddenly stopped fighting with a yelp. The aliens began the injection procedure with Rachel just as roughly as they had with me since she was distracted. Rachel was soon injected with the same stuff I was injected with. She went into the dazed condition and blinked blankly unsure what to feel.

The aliens looked at each other started to talk again, “Diid chewu ussssse tha shame doseage asssss thae lasssst?”

“I diid.” Replied the one still holding the needle.

I gasped and looked at Rachel. She looked at me a little confused.

“Rachey did you hear that?” I asked.

“What did you hear? If you heard what I heard then we both are not crazy.” She said.

“Me not crazy! Ha! I’m crazy and there is nothing more to that. With my luck this is a hallucination or some freaky dream and I'm going to wake up and never remember this ever happened.  Then I'll see you at school with it being the last day and we'll laugh about how improbable this dream would be.  Then it would be brushed off.  This has to be a freaking dream!” I rambled on, more out of it than I thought I would be.  The latter bits coming out as mumbles as I covered my face with my hand wishing I would just wake up already.

Rachel glared. "Oh will you just shut up!"

“Why don’t you just shut up for once,” I snapped back. 

We started to fight again. The aliens looked at us in disbelief. Then they started to whisper amongst themselves.

The fight got worse and we both stood up on the beds yelling at each other. Me shaking a fist at her and her growling at me.  Rachel pulled out a notebook from her messenger bag which had miraculously stayed on her shoulder throughout the whole abduction and threw it at me.  It met it’s mark quite successfully much to my disappointment.

“Oww.” I said as I rubbed my head. “Where did cha get that? I thought you wouldn’t have it.” I whined.

Rachel looked at me and replied, “I have my ways. Now shut up or you’re going to get hit again.”

I stuck my tongue out at her, crossed my arms over my chest and sat down.  I started to mumble something about stupid notebooks under my breath.  It was along the lines of burning a certain notebook and spreading its ashes along some deep and undisclosable piece of land somewhere.  That is if we ever made it back to terra firma at this rate.

“That’s what I thought,” She said as she sat back down obviously not paying attention to my garbled mumblings.

There was silence for quite a while. Both of us looked around wondering why all the aliens had stopped what they were doing just to gawk at some teenagers who almost had a war of only two people.

I glared at the aliens in the room and asked, “What? Two friends can’t have a small fight without having on lookers watch it? Go back to work and leave us alone.  You've already done enough as it is.  We don't need an audience watching us fight.”

What happened next surprised both of us. What seemed to be the head of the whole Med. Lab. looked at us and then looked at the rest of the lab.

“You heard her! GET BACK TO WORK!” it said clearly startling us.

“OK did I just imagine that?” I asked Rachel.

“If so then your imagination has rubbed off on me a little bit more than I expected.”

"That's very dangerous," I said. "You never know what my imagination is going to do next..."

“Then I am afraid.  I really don’t like surprises anymore.”

“You and me both,” I muttered as I ran a hand through my hair snagging knots as I did that.

I had no good feelings about this whole deal.  There was something fishy about all of this.  Not just the fact that the two of us were just infected with something that let us understand these damned aliens who infected us in the first place.  Now that they had us, what are they going to do with us?


	4. Meetings

**Chapter 4 –Meetings—**

* * *

**Wren’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

Rachel and I looked at each other. I still didn't know if this was a dream or really reality.

"Ok. Are we dead, asleep, or awake? Or just all of the above?" I asked her with a very confused and worried look upon my face.

"Uh... Um... I don't know.  I didn’t even think there was an all of the above option with this,” she replied with a worried look as well.

"But you're the Digiexpert." I complained, "You're supposed to know these things."

"I know about Digimon, hence the name Digiexpert." she replied with a scowl.

"But, but, but..."

"No buts, I'm the expert on Digimon NOT aliens and other freaky crap of the sort. Anyway that's your department.  I wash my hands of all freaky crap."

"I own a department? Since when did I own a department?" I asked with a frown.  “I've never owned a department before.”

"Since I said so,” she said with a huff crossing her arms over her chest.

I turned to look at her with a scowl and a small snarl forming on my lips.

We were just about to get into another fight when what seemed to be the chief alien of the med lab butted in. "Excuse me. Can you two discuss this later? We are on a very tight schedule.  And it is very important that we try to keep up with it."

I looked at him and said, "Yeah, whatever, as long as you don't stick me with anymore needles I'll cooperate."

"Oh we aren't testing on you anymore," It said with enthusiasm.

"Should we be happy, relived, or scared?" I inquired raising an eyebrow.

"We'll let you decide," it replied and motioned for two of the guards.

I looked at Rachel and sighed. "Like I asked, should we be happy, relived, or scared?" Rachel answered with a shrug of her shoulders.

With a few quick motions outside the door way another set of guards entered the room.  They, with no respect to either of us, grabbed us as harshly as before and walked toward the door.

Well we were walking away, actually, dragged away down through the corridor by our guards.  Their stride was too long for us to keep up with properly and after a while they just got fed up with trying to allow us to walk. Of course, they picked us up and carried us by our upper arms like we weighed nothing. 

Since I didn’t have to think of keeping up any more I started looking around and saw a glimpse of another alien walking the other direction in the hall we were in. It looked sorta familiar but I couldn't put my finger on the look of what it was supposed to be just like our guards.  And any way I only caught a small look at it.

I was concentrating so hard on the other alien that I didn't pay attention to where we were going. When I brought my attention back into the present I was startled that I should have been thinking about where we were going.  And me being me, without thinking, I blurted out a question.

"Where exactly are you taking us?" I asked looking up at my guard.

"To your quarters," It replied roughly, slightly startled that I had spoken.

"Geez. I only asked," I said pouting. Then asked, "We get quarters?"

"All beings that show that they learned the language of all the known alien races get quarters. You are two of the first few to learn it." It answered without looking at me.

"So we are two of the first few to learn it out of how many?" Rachel asked from behind us.  I could just hear the frown in her voice and the look of concentration that she normally would wear at moments like these.

"The first few died within the first hour.  So technically they're still waiting to see if you die,” one of Rachel’s guards supplied

"And how many were the first few?" I asked trying to look over my shoulder at it.

"Only fifty."

"Only fifty? Oh no. Fifty isn't that much. Why not go with a hundred! Naw, let’s do just a few. Wait you said, and I quote, 'Died within the first hour'. It hasn't been an hour!" I said hysterically as what they had said sunk in.

"Yes, that is true. But we hope that you two will survive."

"This is your fault entirely!" Rachel shouted at me. "You got us all caught up on an alien ship."

"It's not my fault. I only laughed because of the gas!" I shouted back at her. "I didn't wake up this morning and think 'Hey! I think I'll get our whole school caught by aliens by laughing at some odd gas they pump in!'"

We fought all the way to the quarters. When we got there the guards threw us down and walked out. It was obvious they were quite tired of listening to our bickering.  I stood up from the floor and brushed myself off. "Well then, they are definitely not getting a tip."

Rachel rolled her eyes and stood up herself while brushing her clothes off as well.  She adjusted her messenger bag and began looking about the room.  Our fight forgotten as we started walking around looking at the things in the room.  We were startled out of our investigation when we heard a knock at the door.

"Come in!" we both said.

The door opened to reveal two aliens. Both human looking with reptilian tails wrapped around their waists.  They were wearing what could only be described in my mind as fighting uniforms that freed up their legs.  This revealed some wicked looking clawed toes.  They stood rather straight and were quite pompous looking.

My jaw almost hit the ground and so did Rachel's.  Recognition of who these people were hit us like a steel toe boot to the face. 

Toven and Vivadel were Reptivals of an anime we would watch often when we’d hang out after school.  Rachel had almost all the discs to the series and we would always try to talk about the newest episode as soon as possible as they came out.  Some part of us wanted to have one fifth the power that they did where we could boost our own physical powers with a projection of our own life energy.

I looked at them and said, "Can you excuse us for one minute?"

I grabbed Rachel's arm and pulled her to the far corner as far away from the door way as possible. I thought for a moment trying to bring back our native language in hopes that they couldn't understand us.  So in English I said with excitement, "Do you know who these two are?"

"Yeah they are Toven and Vivadel. But I thought that Vivadel was human." She replied still startled at the appearance of two anime characters actually standing in the doorway of our room.

"In another dimension but not in this one it seems," I added. "And we just had to be captured by Reptivals. But why are they working with that other race?  Is there an actual reason for it?"

"I have no clue. Maybe they have something the Reptivals want." Rachel replied.

“Or possibly they want a common goal,” I muttered rubbing the side of my nose and placing a hand on my hip.

"Are you quite done?" Toven asked tapping his foot impatiently.

"Hold on, one more moment." I said with a smile as I turned to look at them.  I then turned back around and my smile turned into a grimace as I looked back to Rachel.

"So what are we going to do?" I asked continuing in English.

"Don't tick them off. You know they can blast us away and or apart," Rachel said.  “Or destroy us just as easily in any way they see fit.  We're on their turf now.  We have to watch ourselves with them.”

"So in other words. I speak when spoken to," I whispered with a pout.

"You got that right," Rachel confirmed grimly with a nod.

I sighed when we turned back around to look at them.

"So are you two finally finished?" Vivadel asked gruffly irritation evident in her voice.

"Yes ma'am." I responded I said with a salute. Vivadel rolled her eyes at me but I could see the corner of her lips lifting slightly.

"Good now if you two would follow Vivadel." Toven said motioning to her. Then he added, "She will take you back to med lab for a checkup. And then get you something better to wear. You might as well be presentable enough to be interrogated."

“Oh boy,” I muttered walking forward toward Vivadel, “I always wanted to be interrogated.  It was always on my bucket list of things to do before I die.”

“Well, it’s a good chance that we will die before the hour is up,” Rachel muttered back.  “So you got your wish.”

* * *

 

**Elsewhere on board....**

* * *

 

**Narrator....**

* * *

 

Zim sat up suddenly on his bed looking a little startled.  There was an odd feeling in the air and his squeedlyspooch twisted in a way that signaled something big was coming his way.  His squeedlyspooch had never been wrong before and this turn of events had to be something bigger than his capture.  He looked around briefly to see if he could pinpoint exactly what was going to happen.

Frowning Zim lay back on his cot.  He guessed he would just have to wait to find out what was going on.  Let things play out themselves.  Things seemed to work out better that way.  A little less explosions and a lot more living.  Personally living was high on his list at the moment.  And escaping was running a close second.


	5. New Home Sweet Home

  
****Chapter 5—New Home Sweet Home—** **

* * *

  
****Wren’s P.O.V….** **

* * *

Rachel and I were soon taken down a long corridor after we had left the one room. Vivadel stopped at a room at the end of a corridor with a large beige door and swept her hand over the control panel at the side. She ushered us in and closed the door behind all of us. Leaning back Vivadel rested against the wall beside the door studying us.

Vivadel then smirked as we looked about the room. "You know, not ever one gets to be interrogated."

"Not everyone survived the injections." I muttered lowly more to myself than to anyone else.  Rachel must have heard me regardless and elbowed me in the gut.

"Will you shut up? You know speak when spoken to or you might get blown away." Rachel muttered back to me.

"You two are really starting to annoy me." Videl frowned.  She was obviously tired of our constant bickering already.  "Anyway. We have a selection of clothing that may fit in your species category. They are over there," She flicked her hand over to the left side of the room, "and the bathroom is through that door." She pointed to the right of the room. "You will stay in these quarters until Toven or I come to get you."

Vivadel turned to leave the room but paused, turning to fix us with a hard look and asked, "Do you understand?  Because the guards outside of this room will not hesitate to follow their orders.”

I raised my hand, my mouth overriding the common sense section of my brain.  "Uh yeah. If I say no, what would you do?"

Rachel then hit me with that blasted notebook that she pulled out of bag. "Stupid. Just stay in the room and stop asking stupid questions!"

"Ow. Fine forget I said anything." I replied as I started to rub my head wondering if soon there was going to be a permanent lump there.

Vivadel left the room with a roll of her eyes and a mutter something close to stupid humans and something about should have just destroying the planet we came from.

* * *

 

**Later....**

* * *

 

Rachel and I were sitting down at the table that was in the room after we both got cleaned up.  It felt like it took a full hour to get all the grim and gross crud off from my time in the holding cell we were in first.  I know I didn’t know how long we’d actually been in there but by the smell of it quite a bit.  And I know for a fact Rachel took just as long as I did in that shower as well.  I was thankful that I wasn't the only one that just felt gross.  Though, I could have probably washed for longer and still smell that scent on me.

When I came out I saw that Rachel was wearing something close to her usual outfit. It was actually a surprise to see her in almost the same clothes as she had on when we were abducted.  Part of me wondered why she chose to because of the still fresh memory of being abducted. For me I knew I had to change into something fresh and new that didn’t hold as much of a memory to it.  Thankfully I had found a pair of baggy jean like pants and a plain shirt of sorts that would do for lounging around.  At this moment I just didn’t feel like being all posh and starched if I was going to be here for a while.  It just wasn’t worth it.

 I was just finishing brushing my hair with a sigh that caught Rachel's attention.

Rachel looked at me, sighed, and shook her head. "Why can't you wear anything that is formal for this meeting?"

I looked at her and said, "Because I’ve just had enough of everything at this rate.  We are probably going to die, so why die uncomfortable?  Why?"

She just shook her head again and went back to her thoughts and her notebook.

“You know, I think it's been more than an hour,” I murmured drawing Rachel out of her thoughts once again.

She turned to look at me.  “I think you're right Wren.  It has to be more than an hour since the injections and we're not dead.”

“Yet.  There’s still time for us to kick the bucket you know.”

“We should just be lucky that we didn't die within the first few minutes.”

“Too true.”

“Do you feel any different?

“No, actually.  I don’t really feel any different.”

“Maybe that’s a good sign.”

“I hope so.  I would rather like to live a bit longer.”

We were in the room for about what seemed like hours doing nothing.  I had investigated the room fully, ever single nook and cranny and couldn't find anything to entertain myself with.  I paused behind a chair across from Rachel when I said, "I'm extremely bored," and I hung myself over the back of the chair.

"For once I agree with you,” she brought her attention back to me.

"What can we do? I have an attention span of a fruit fly and after a while this does get boring."

"I wish I had my notebook."

"You do. You have hit me several times today with it," I said frowning at her.  I was still upset about being hit so many times in what seemed like just a span of a day.

"That is not my writing notebook though." Rachel retorted scowling slightly at me.

"What's the difference? They both are used to hit me over the head with and used to write in," I said with a shrug. "I didn't think there was much of a difference between the two. And anyway all I know is that they both hurt."

Rachel was about to reply with what was most likely a scathing remark but never got to say anything else in return because the door just opened. I scrambled to get up out of the chair I was splayed over.  Toven walked in with what looked like his youngest brother Tanic. Toven looked a little peeved at this. But both of us were surprised at this because Tanic looked peeved too.

I looked at Tanic with a glare and muttered, "Siblings in any situation can always be annoying."

Rachel elbowed me in the ribs. I shot a glare at her.

Toven cleared his throat and looked at Tanic, "Tanic is here to take you to your cell. It seems that you will not be interrogated."

"Is that a good or bad thing?" I asked blinking up at him.

"It depends." Toven said with a shrug. "In this case it might be a bad thing."

"Oh goody more bad luck." I muttered.

Rachel and I stood up properly and followed Tanic out of the room. He took us along the ever twisting maze of the ship; because that is the only place I knew we could be at this time.  We were followed by two kind of burly guards who were taking their jobs very seriously.  And so far it seemed that the corridors were never ending and the doors just multiplied.

"Don't get lost. I don't want to have to find you later." Tanic warned us while glancing over his shoulder.

Rachel stepped on my foot a few times until I move in step behind her. She glared at me and I moved back in front of her.  Sooner than we would have liked we came to what looked like a long hallway of interconnected cells.  It reminded me of a huge prison the way it was set up. And by looking in them several aliens were occupying a good bit of the cells already. Some whistled and clicked at us as we passed.  I fought the large urge to scowl at them as they passed.

I glanced around and noticed one or two that looked familiar. "Rachel look." I said as I pointed to one.

"What?" she asked as she follows my finger.

"That alien right there is an Arvigdie."

"A what?" Rachel asked me with a confused look.

"An Arvigdie is a species of alien in my Metamorph books," I replied matter-o-factly.  “Many had technology to morph into any creature that they wanted if they had the DNA in their systems.  They are enemies of the Filigra.  Those little creatures take control of anyone by wrapping themselves around their necks and attaching themselves to the base of the skull and controlling humans that way.  It's really gross if you think about it.  But they’re in a huge war to take control of the Arvigdie’s planet.”

"Ohhkay.... That is gross. What is that one?" she asked pointing to a little green alien. He had red eyes, two antennas, and a pod on his back.  He was eyeing us through the bars of his cell with a frown on his face as he leaned against the side of the cell.  I made eye contact and saw his antenna perk up just a little and the frown become a confused look.

"If I'm correct that is an Irken. You know like Invader Zim, the tv show? Haven't you every watched the show?"

"Maybe... Wait... You mean The Invader Zim? The one with the little robot thingy?  It's a show Wren, he can't be standing there.  It was made up!"

"That has to be him or someone from the Irken race though.  I'd remember how they look no matter what," I replied.  “It is another of my favorite shows you know.  I’d be a horrible fan if I didn’t recognize the creatures of the show.”

We both ran into Tanic's back when he stopped in front of the cell across from the Irken.

"This is your chamber," He said. "Try not to screw it up.  You'll be staying here quite a long time.  That is if no others from the slave cells kill you out during free time."

The first thing I notice was that it was small.  Maybe ten by twelve feet. It was well kept though with only the basic of basics. A hidden section for the bathroom and a hidden section for one cot were the only privacies. I could tell you could pull out another cot from underneath the first cot. "Goody. At least we can keep separate beds." I muttered.

"You can have you beds to where it's a pull out or you can have them like bunks." Tanic said simply without looking at either of us.  He then ushered us into the cell, locked the door and turned to leave us there.

"Who gets top bunk?" I asked Rachel as soon as Tanic left.

"We can switch bunks ever night." Rachel said with a shrug. "Actually I really don't care.  At least we have a bed each."

I set about snooping around the cell while Rachel lay on the bottom bunk. I was just turning the corner from where the bunks were when I heard whispering.

"Did you see the new people?", "Yeah a funny looking lot ain't they?", "Wonder why they're here?", "Probably the same reason we're here you moron.", "I wonder if they can talk?", "They look intelligent, why shouldn't they?", "Hey, the little green alien, the Irken, looks intelligent and he doesn't talk.", "Maybe he doesn't know how.".

"Wren tell them to shut up. I am trying to concentrate." Rachel said.

"HEY!" I snarled, "WHY DON'T YOU IDIOTS SHUT UP! WE WON'T BE PART OF THE GOSSIP CIRCLE!"

The whole place fell quite. No one made a peep at me having snapped at them.  I didn't understand how they didn't notice that we did talk on our way here and chatted a little bit while in the hall.  It was at that moment though I knew that not all aliens were brilliant.  They were just like majority of the human race, obliviously dumb.

"Thank you." I added quietly and turned around to lean on the bars of the cell.

After a while the silence was broken by a single question.

"Who are you to think you can boss us around you little squishy freak?”

I turned around to see who said it and replied, "Well at least I know what I am.  And there are plenty of people who are in love with my soft squishy body.  Keepers only know what would want you besides your own hand."

The whole corridor filled with 'oooooo's' and 'that had to hurt's.

I caught the eye of the Irken across from me and saw him smirk at the comment.  My insides twisted in an oddly pleasant way, quite pleased with being able to amuse the stern looking alien and causing those ruby eyes to glint with mischief.  And the corner of my mouth twitched up in a half smile.  Maybe it’d be my goal while we were stuck here to see if I could make him smile more.


	6. Meet My Muse

  
****Chapter 6—Meet My Muse—** **

* * *

  
****Wren’s P.O.V….** **

* * *

My attention was brought away from the Irken by a voice that replied to the taunt with, "Wait until we have our free hour of exercise. I'll get you back for that comment you filthy little being."

"And I'm a giant five foot tall day glow green space gerbil with a six foot long tail." I replied with a sneer from the bars of the cell.

"Wren, you think you _are_ a gerbil." Rachel said from the bottom bunk in a droll tone without looking up from her notebook.

"But I'm not day glow green yet. I'm still purple, remember?  It's not yet the change of summer yet.  Well maybe by now but that's beside the point. And it all depends if I decided that I still wanted to be a giant gerbil. Personally I wouldn't mind being something different."

"But you still thought you're a gerbil.  And you can't change your species.  That's not how it goes."

"I know. But I think I may change that. I wanna be something new," I said as I turned around to look at her.  My attention completely upon her and not the aliens outside of our little cell.

"Why? You have been a gerbil for three or four years now.  Why change after all that time?" Rachel replied matter-o-factly.

"I know but my muse is telling me that I can't have her identity. I might change to a kitty but a cat has been so overdone.  Or a dragon. A dragon would be cool...  But really over done as well.." I said and tapped my chin thoughtfully.

"You have a muse? And she doesn't want you to take her identity? Wren space..." Rachel was about to say something else but I cut in.

"Space the final frontier. These are the voyages of the star ship Enterprise and her crew. Her mission, to go where no man, or space gerbil, has gone before." I said and fell into a fit of giggles until Rachel threw a notebook at me.

I winced as it almost landed a direct hit to my head.  I turned just in time to be smacked in the shoulder by the offending object.

"You need to stop listening to Andy. He is starting to rot your mind." Rachel said as got up to get the notebook that she had thrown. "But as I was saying. Space has finally gotten to ya."

"Hey how did you do that?" I asked totally not listening to her. I had turned around and was looking into the cell across from us.

"Do what?" Rachel asked me back perplexed.  “Get my notebook?  I stood up and got it you dork.”

"Not you." I said to Rachel and pointed across to the other cell. "The little doggy.  It has to be GIR or a SIR like it.  I didn't think it actually used that disguise!"

Rachel rolled her eyes and came over to look at what I was pointing at. It was a shiney little robot with big blue eyes and a little antenna dudeley-bob on his head. He was sitting by the Irken and playing with pieces of crumpled paper.

"Wren that is a robot." Rachel said as she walked away.

I got up and followed her protesting, "But it is, or was a doggy."

"Wren go do something, you are annoying me right now.  I can’t handle too much more of this crap right now."

"Fine." I pouted and walked to the other side of the cell mumbling. Luckily I had a pencil with me and had hidden it in my hair.  I was amazed I still had it throughout the searches and everything else.  I had only found it while cleaning myself up.  I had taken my hair down and there it was.  Of course, I always had a bad habit of forgetting they were there whether it was a pen in my hair or one placed behind my ear.

I looked about for something to sketch, even though I didn't have a sketchbook on me.  I found a piece of floor and wall that was near the bars that would suffice for my sketching needs.  Looking about I tried to find a subject to draw but my attention just kept coming back to the little SIR unit that I thought was GIR.  He was still sitting on the floor humming to himself and playing with the crumpled paper balls.   It was sorta cute and I had nothing else to sketch so I started to sketch him.

Time flew by as I perfected the picture. It looked just like the robot or at least what I thought looked like it. The Irken was watching me with mild interest as I drew.  He couldn't see what exactly what I was doing but was curious all the same. On the same section of wall I started to draw the Irken as well.  And why not?  He’d not really moved while I’d been sketching his companion and the artist in me couldn’t help but admire his jaw line and the way he held himself.

I was just getting to foot done when someone or something said really close to my ear, "Ooo. Nice. Are you going to add more detail to the antenna next?"

_'Wait a minute_.' I thought. ' _Rachel doesn't sound like that_.'

I looked up to my left and saw a gerbil the size of a large cat with dragon wings and small round ears with what looked like antenna coming from the tops. It had small icy blue eyes and a little pink nose. The fur color had stripes of black, gold, cream, red, and a touch of purple and pink, which just happened to change to a dull silvery gray when it looked at me.

"Wait a minute. You're my...you're my...you're my..." I stuttered.

"I'm your..." it said playfully, amused at my antics.

"You're my muse!" I blurted out. "Ahhh!" I screamed and stood up. The creature fell off my shoulders with an 'omph!' I ran to hide behind Rachel who was standing a few feet away to see what I was up to since I had been so quiet for too long.

"Oh thanks. Nice welcome." It said as it glared at me from its back. It rolled over onto its four feet and started to clean itself off.

Across the corridor the Irken was laughing his head off.   He was holding his ribs as he cracked up and leaned against the bars for support.  The little robot looked confused for a moment then started laughing too along with his master.

I came out from behind Rachel and to glare at the alien and said, "That was not funny. Anyway I never knew my muse was real until she suddenly popped up without warning."

It stopped laughing and looked at me. "Puny alien scum. It is only funny because it shows that your race is far inferior to the great Irken Empire.  An Invader would not have reacted  the way you did."

"Well if you are so high an' mighty why are you stuck in that cell?" my muse asked looking up from her cleaning.

I laughed and said, "Go Rouk! Eat that Irken scum."

"You won't be laughing when I get a hold of you." It said shaking his fist at me.

"Well, you laughed at me first. And for that I may get you back before you could touch me,” I snarled.

Both of us didn't say anything else, we only glared at each other for a few seconds.

"Well human, if that is the case then we are actually now even. I will find another way and time to do something to you.  Something horrible and devious," He said as he dismissed me with a wave of his hand. He turned around and ignored me.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

Rachel looked at me and shook her head.

"What?" I asked tilting my head to the side.

"You can never go anywhere without getting into a fight, can you?"

"Well, no.  It doesn't seem to be that I can just keep to myself."

"But that is why I chose her as my human." My muse, Rouk said as she flew over to me and landed on my shoulder. She gave my head a hug.

"I am surrounded by alien life and my best friend has found her muse. Can this get any weirder?" Rachel asked to no one walking back to the bunks.

"You should know that answer by now and you should know never to ask that.  Things get worse when people say that sort of thing," I said frowning. I raised a hand to brush it across Rouk's ears, still a little confused as to how she came into being.

"Yeah I should, shouldn't I?" she replied sighing. She stretched before crawling onto the bottom bunk.

"Yep. It can only get weirder."

"Unfortunately I knew that." Rachel said with a sigh.

* * *

 

  
****Narrator....** **

* * *

Zim watched as the two pale aliens talked.  They were fascinating, yet infuriating.  The taller, paler of the two had fight as well.  There was a spark in her eyes that reminded him of many an Irken who had been great.  If she would have been an Irken she would have gone far by now.  She had a bite to her that was slightly endearing and he found himself drawn to the girl. 

He had to snort at that, if Irkens could snort seeing as they did not have the hideous olfactory organs that many species had.  Why would he waste his time with those weak aliens when he was part of a superior race like the Irken race.  Of course.  That really didn't matter much now that he was in this cell.  Really.  What did it matter?

And he frowned.  Honestly, was he even an Invader now?  Caged like one of the common beasts or aliens like those the Armada had taken over before. 

How he hated these new thoughts running through his mind.


	7. The Sketches of Pure Doom

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These early chapter titles are just weird..... I wrote the first chapters in high school.... soooooo yeah.....

  
****Chapter 7—The Sketches of Pure Doom—** **

* * *

  
****Wren’s P.O.V….** **

* * *

Rachel soon got bored of the Irken and me and went to the cot.  She started to write in her notebook without looking up again. I had convinced her before that to give me a piece or two of her notebook paper.  Rouk and I shrugged at the same time when she grumbled a little under her breath about it and I sat back down and started to finish the sketch I was doing of the Irken.  I turned to transferring the sketches I'd done to paper.  Rouk curled around my shoulders, yawned and soon fell asleep. I couldn't blame her. It was pretty boring watching me sketch and there was nothing else to do in the cell.

I started to hum the song the SIR was humming and soon decided to do another pic of him. This time he looked at me and waved. I waved back for the heck of it.

"I like that song." The unit said with a smile.

"Well you just got me liking it too." I replied as I drew one of its arms.

"Whacha doin'?" it asked as it came up to the bars.  It gripped them in its tiny hands, curiosity lighting up its face.

"This," I replied as I raised the paper up and showed it the pictures.

"Ooo." It said as it looked at them and pulled at its master's arm to get him to look at the pictures as well.

"Eh?" he asked as he follows the little robot's point.

He stepped closer to the front of his cell and glared at the pic. He scratched his chin in thought and nodded.

I looked at him quizzically. I actually couldn't decide if he liked it or not. It was really hard to tell; even though he had some human features I just couldn't read his.  Nervousness twitched through my stomach and knotted it tight.  I just didn’t want him to judge the sketches wrongly.  I never did like having my art work critiqued.

"Intriguing pale alien scum. For some odd reason you have captured the features of Zim almost perfectly." He finally said. "And GIR looks almost intelligent in one of those drawings."

"I should take that as a compliment Zim. Because, as I figure it, that might be the only one I'll get from you while I'm in the cell across from you." I replied in a cool tone, actually trying not to anger anyone or let my nervousness show.  I also didn't want to give my shock away because I knew of him and had been right about my guess.  But at this point, I wasn't sure if his personality from the show was this actual Zim's personality.  I wasn't going to take any chances.  “And I am a human, not a pale alien scum.”

Zim stood there in thought for a few minutes and looked at me. I could tell he was studying my face and expression.  His eyes, ghosting over every inch of me. But while he was doing that Rachel spoke up and I turned my head to look at her with a swirl of my hair.

"Wren, if you don't mind, don't get anyone else ticked. I really want to stay alive long enough to try and escape." She said without looking up from her writing.

"Fine." I sighed. "I'll actually listen to you for once.  Not that I was trying to start anything though."

"Good. Now behave."

I turned back around to see that Zim had taken a seat in front of me and was waiting until I was finished with my conversation with Rachel.

"And you would like to say something?" I asked politely.

"Yes you squishy alien. For once I can't believe I'm saying this. I see no reason to fight with you."

"And is that a good thing?"

"Yes, actually it is. You see we may have a single goal.  You probably want to escape and I want to get out of here as well.  I have a mission to go destroy a planet in this system," Zim said as he waved his hand.  “The third planet I think it was.”

I paused and blinked at him for a moment.  The gears in my head turning as I took in that statement.  Of course he'd say that and to be truthful, when I really thought about it it didn't bother me one bit.  Gut didn't even twinge when I thought of Zim trying to take over.  "You can have it then." I said as I growled.

"Wha?" Zim asked in disbelief. His jaw dropped at what he just heard not sure if he actually heard it.

"Wren you don't mean that." Rachel hissed at me.

"I do to!" I yelled back. "I hate Earth. There is nothing really interesting about it. I mean schools are just there to torture us. Work is boring unless you get to blow things up. And I really hate my chores." I complained.

"It's not all that bad." Rachel replied in defense. "You would miss some things. Like chocolate, more sketchbooks, more pencils, and a few other things."

"Yeah I would miss that. But not the other stuff." I said thoughtfully. "But to me if all the world was taken over by one main figure then, hey no more wars.  No religious battles over who’s god is the only god or whatever.  There’d be no radical groups trying to take out other groups just because they didn’t like how they looked at them.  It’d be a lot more peaceful.  Though, Communism really isn’t something American’s want.  So…. Crap…."

"There still would be wars you idiot." Rachel replied.

"Fine. Whatever..."

"Fine." Rachel said and went back to what she was writing.

"As you were saying?" I asked as I turned my attention back over to Zim.

"Well I...I uhhh...um..." he stuttered looking a little embarrassed.

"Spit it out or I'll ignore you too." I growled.

"I would like to offer a truce." He said simply.

This time my jaw dropped. It was my turn to study his features. The look in his eyes was that of slight desperation and a trust that I didn't know if it was rightly placed.  He was telling the truth from what I could tell but I did want a second opinion.

I nudged Rouk with my cheek and she muttered in her sleep.  I nudged her again and when she didn't wake up I blew in her ear.

"What?" she asked blinking at me a few times.

"You're my muse, right?"

"Yeah. I was shaped by your imagination. What of it?"

"So in my imagination you could read feelings, can you still do it?"

"Yes." She replied matter-o-factly. "I can still do that.  Why?"

"Tell me if Zim is telling the truth." I said as I motioned to Zim.

She sat there for a moment and blinked. Shaking her head a little in what seemed an odd way she looked at me. Her icy blue eyes focused and she soon replied in a whisper, "He's afraid. No...no...worried and lonely. But he is telling the truth."

I nodded and looked at Zim who was fighting to get GIR off his arm. I giggled a little and that brought Zim's attention back onto me. "I agree to this truce, but," I said in a pause and his face fell, "but in agreeing with this Rachel and Rouk are included."

"Fine." he said nodding. "Then unfortunately GIR has to be included in it too human."

"Okays." I replied with a huge smile and went back to my drawing as Zim went back to getting the insane little robot of his arm.  It didn't seem like he was going to get him off any time soon.

I drew pictures of other aliens that I could see from my position and shaded them. I was trying to put the last touches on some species of alien that I didn’t know when a guard came into the middle of the hallway.

The guard sneered as he looked at me, "For all you who are new here are the rules for the exercise hour or two if you're really good. One, no picking fights, this means you you Garisoniv." He shouted and pointed to the back of the corridor.

"I wouldn't dream of it sir." The same voice that threatened me earlier said.

"That's because you don't dream." Another voice retorted. Laughter was rippling through the cells like waves.

"Back to the matter." The guard shouted and the laughter stopped. "Two: no one tries to escape. Three: let's all try to play nice. Ok?" More laughter was brought on by the last rule.

The cell doors opened and the aliens filed out and down the corridor. I caught a glimpse of Zim in the crowd but lost him in the throng of people as they jostled their way down the hall.

Rachel was up and beside me in a few minutes caring her notebook in hand. The crowd soon dispersed and Zim was standing in his cell waiting for us.  Arms crossed and a frown set upon his face.

"Wow." I said as we stepped out of our cells at the same time. "You're being a gentleman."

Zim wave his hand, "A pitiful human detail. I was only waiting for you to exit so we can talk about our escape."

I shook my head and Rachel rolled her eye as we followed Zim out into the exercise area.  I was taken aback by how vast it was. The whole area was basically a dome with a flat surface. Nothing too interesting to look at, except the dome was a material that was transparent and I could see the space outside.  I was vaguely aware that nothing looked familiar as my eyes darted to look at everything at once.

"Cool." I muttered with a little awe.

"You have not seen space before?" Zim asked astonished.

"From the ground, yeah. But not while in space." I replied still gazing upwards and wrapped my arms around my waist.  “That was left to the very few that were trained to go into space.  But they were also a very few as well.  I’ve  always wanted to go into space though.”

We floundered around the yard for a while until we found an empty spot and sat down. Zim was quiet as he looked at everyone else in the area warily.  My attention was split between people, well alien, watching and looking at space.  Rachel was ignoring us and I was pretty much use to it. But just for the heck of it I poked her and she hit me with her notebook.

"Don't do that again." Rachel threatened.

"But can you help us with a plan?" I begged.

"A plan to escape? What do you think I'm doing now?"

"You never told me that." I said almost whining.  “You never tell me anything!  No one does!”

She hit me again with the notebook and added, "Only because you'd blurt it out."

"Your friend seems more intelligent than she first looked." Zim said to me, smirk upon his face.

"Well I guess that should be a..." Rachel started to say when her attention was caught by an alien coming over and standing a few feet away.

It looked like an elf but with orange skin. He smiled at Rachel and said, "You know I like girls who are more intelligent and are defensive about their opinions."

I shifted from my spot on the floor to where I was balancing on the balls of my feet. I placed my hands on the floor and looked at the guy, narrowed my eyes and started to growl lowly in the back of my throat. He was not giving off a friendly feeling at all and personally I wanted him gone. Rouk also started to growl from my shoulder as my unease filtered into her.

Rachel looked at the guy from where she was sitting and replied, "Will you shut up? I have had my last nerve cut by people cutting in when I'm talking and I swear I am ready to punch you if you get too annoying. So leave or else."

"Well then try girlie. It probably won't do you any good." He stepped a step closer, sneer on his face twisting his features grotesquely.

I started to growl a lot more and Rachel shot a glare at me with her hand out stretched toward me. The look basically said not to do anything. Getting the feeling she wanted to handle it on her own I quieted down.  I sat down with a small snort at being told not to do anything and started to pout.

Rachel then stood up, handed her notebook to me, brushing off her clothes quietly without a word.  She then shot a look at the orange Elfin being and said, "Being raised with two annoying brothers can teach you something, how to ignore and how to defend yourself. If you would like to try me then go ahead. But if not then take your face and get out of my sight.  I'm quite tired of people thinking that girls are pushovers and just because we're new doesn't mean that I'm going to roll over and show my belly to the first person demanding it."

"Why you little..." the alien said as he started cursing under his breath. Then without warning he threw a punch.

Rachel saw this and grabbed his arm and twisted it around toward his back and yanked up, hard. The alien gave a yelp of surprise and started to struggle.

Rachel twisted his arm a little more strongly and replied to that yelp, "Go back to your friends and I'll let you keep your dignity." And with that she pushed him out onto the floor.

By now the whole dome was laughing that that one alien almost got beat up by an Earth girl.

"And who told me not to get into any fights." I asked with a slightly cold glare.

"I didn't start it, I only finished it."

Zim was laughing his head off by now.

It occurred to me that Zim was a bit odder than I first led myself to believe. I shook that thought away and shrugged it off.  There was no point in trying to analyze the alien when he’d probably leave as soon as we escaped this hell hole.  No point in getting attached.

"Can we discuss the plan Rachel has thought of so we can get out of this place. Sorry but some of these aliens give me the creeps.  They're looking at me in a none too pleasant way and it's bothering me," I said with a small shudder and a glance about.

"Wren, I thought you felt at home here." Rachel said sickening sweet.

"Oh yeah. A bunch of aliens that like to eye me as their next meal or _toy_ makes me feel right at home." I replied with emphasis on the word toy.

Rachel and also Zim shuddered with the thought of that. I think that they both got the description right for the type of toy I meant.  And personally it really wasn't something I wanted to think into farther about myself.  That thought was just a little too disturbing for my liking.

"Enough with this talk. Let us get down to business." Zim said as he dismissed the thought with a glance at Rachel's notebook.

"Okay. Here is my plan; we will include anything as soon as we review it." Rachel said as she laid it open onto the floor between the three of us.

Rachel began reviewing the information as quietly as she could with us.  Every so often one of use would come up with something to add.  The plan was taking shape but part of me wondered if this idea would actually succeed.

* * *

 

  
****Narrator….** **

* * *

Zim looked at the plans that Rachel had laid out before them.  They were quite ingenious really and he wasn’t quite sure if the human had actually created them.  His ill ease at offering a truce with the two ebbed and he started to feel that little bit of hope at actually making it off the ship alive started to come back.  The taller of the two though still unnerved him.  She was as much of a force of her own as the shorter one.  But it was her flashing eyes that caused most of his unease.

She may have acted rash many a time but she had an aura of a ferocious fighter when she had shifted as the other alien came forward.  Part of him never wanted to actually see her actually attack and defend her friend.  But there was that small part of him that would cackle in glee as she attacked her foe.


	8. Unexpected Changes

  
****Chapter 8—Unexpected Changes—** **

* * *

  
****Wren’s P.O.V….** **

* * *

Zim, Rachel, and I had just finished reviewing the plan for the fifth time when they herded us back into our cells. We would be staying the night in the cell then try the plan out in the morning. Rachel was on the bottom bunk of our beds and I was on the top one staring at the ceiling. She was writing in her notebook and mumbling to herself about not having her CD player. I on the other hand was drawing in again on the paper I had snitched before. It was basically things like dragons, gryphons, and other little odd doodles that were my common go to when I was bored.

I looked up to see a guard coming and quickly hid the papers and Rachel hid her notebook. The guard scowled at us and we both returned it without thinking. The Reptival guard laughed at us. Rouk hissed and a hologram shimmered into a large black saber toothed panther form around her small bio-mech body. She growled at him and bared her ivory canines the size of butcher knives. The guard growled back at Rouk and she yelped. Dropping the projection she flew up behind me and hid shivering. The guard walked away laughing at her.

I shook my head at her.  She was definitely not the bravest but her heart was in it.

"He wouldn't do that if I had my plasma cannon working." Rouk said with a snort.

"True," I replied and petted her head. "But none of us would have survived it."

Rachel just shook her head at us and asked totally off the subject, "Do you remember the plan?"

"Yep." I replied as I leaned over the bunk. "But why do I have to start it?"

"Because you're loud, mouthy, annoying, and can get into trouble without even trying," She replied with a shrug.

"But…" I started to protest. "Wait a frellen minute," I added cutting off my last thought, "I am not loud!"

"You are too." Rachel replied.

"Am Not!"

"Are Too!"

"Am Not!"

"You are too. Now shut up!" she said and hit me with her notebook.

I fell out of the top bunk and hit the floor face first.

At that Zim looked over at us and shook his head. "I have no clue why I, Zim, am escaping with two creatures that are that stupid." He said still shaking his head.

"Well Zim.." I said getting up rubbing my face, "Maybe we only act like idiots to hide our real intelligence."

"Well Wren. Sometimes I don't think you are acting." Rachel said without looking up from her notebook.

"Shut up." I replied and smacked at her with my hand.  I missed by a mile. "But Zim, we also act like idiots because we are friends." I then turned around, slid my shoes off and hoped on my bunk again. I faced Zim and asked, "Do you have friends or best friends _Zim_?" I stressed a little on his name.  I felt bad as soon as that left my mouth but it was too late now.

Zim hesitated then puffed out his chest and replied, "Irken invaders do not need best friends."

Rachel and I studied him a minute. I shook my head and Rachel sighed.

"Yeah Zim, whatever you say. I'm gonna go to bed since I have to start the plan in the morning." I said taking off my socks and laying them at the foot of the bed.  I yawned while pulling the covers down a bit and curled up into the covers.

" 'Irken invaders do not need friends' my foot." Rachel muttered going back to her writing. "He needs a big reality check if he thinks that."

Without Rachel knowing it he had heard the last statement. He visibly changed. His little perky antenna dropped noticeably and his face fell.  His whole posture screamed insecure and alone. He put up a good front but deep inside, he just wanted what everyone else seemed to have but him.  Someone besides GIR to stick by his side like Rachel and I.

"Maybe you could hit him with your notebook Rachel, and whack some sense into him." Rouk suggested to Rachel with a yawn and curled up beside me.

"I don't even think Rachel's notebook could knock sense into him. His head is probably harder than mine," I murmured sleepily, cuddling into the blankets more.

"Shut up." Rachel said and whacked me a good one.

"Ow, what was that for?" I asked sitting up and rubbing my head.

"That was payback." She replied. "And anyway I hit you and you still don't listen to me. Maybe it will work on him better than on you."

"Probably not. But you can try anyway." I said with a shrug and lay back down.  It wasn't long till I dozed off.  It had been one hell of a day and I barely noticed when I had passed out.

* * *

 

  
****Later….** **

* * *

I woke up very uncomfortable.  There was a heavy presence on my chest and it was slightly hard to draw in a deep breath. I knew it wasn't Rouk because she was sleeping, curled up by my ear.  Her whiskers tickling my cheek ever so slightly as she twitched in her sleep and gave a sniffling sort of snore.  I knew it wasn't Rachel.  She would never in a million years get this close.  So I cracked open an eye to see exactly was what on my chest.  My eyes widened only to see that GIR was the thing sitting on my chest.

"Whaaaa!" I shouted in response to the sight shoving the little robot off my chest.

"Ahhhh!" came a reply and the little robot fell off my bunk.

"GIR! How in the whole frellen abducted high school did you get in here?" I whispered waspishly while looking at him from the edge of the bunk hoping to god Rachel was too tired to have even woken from my exclamation.

He just shrugged and said, "I dunno."

I raised a questioning eyebrow and asked again through gritted teeth, "GIR how did you get in here?"

"Through the vent." He replied and pointed to a gaping hole in the wall.  I could only assume that that was the vent he was talking about.

"Ohhhhh." I said and looked around. Everyone else was asleep even with our little out bursts. "GIR, why in the world would you wake me up when nobody else is awake?"

"Because!" he answered giggling.

"Because why exactly?" I frowned.  Personally rolling over and trying to go back to sleep was starting to sound good to me at the moment.  I just didn’t want to have to deal with this crap.  It was probably the middle of the night which meant that I shouldn’t have even been about to put two and two together right now.

"Because I wanna show ya somethin'" he replied with a stupid little smile and walked toward the gaping hole.

I hadn't noticed it until now because it was just a giant gaping black void. Of course no one would have noticed it because it looked just like a wall panel any other time. I got up carefully as not to wake Rachel or Rouk up. I studied it and then measured it with a guess. GIR had climbed in it already and was waiting for me. I could barely see him with how dark it was but his eyes showed up just fine.

I sighed and went toward the vent.  What else was I was going to do?  I was already awake.  There was probably not a chance I was going to get back to sleep any time soon now that my curiosity was perked.  Possibly with my luck GIR would just torture me awake again if I didn’t follow him regardless. 

With another sigh I stepped into the opening of the vent and was amazed that I could fit into it with a lot of room to spare. GIR started to walk and I crawled after him. For quite a while I followed the insane little robot though about a dozen twists and turns and at least one small, tight squeeze. We soon stopped at GIR's show-and-tell. He pushed the panel and it fell into a bright room. I blinked a few times to get adjusted to the light and saw it was a closet. I got out and looked around. It wasn't just a closet it was a clothing closet. It had a mirror that lined one full wall and shelves lined another.

"Um… GIR? What is so great about this room?" I asked with a hand on my hip and a perplexed look on my face.

"It has ma' fwiend in it!" he squealed and ran to the mirror and tried to hug it.  When he bounced off the wall he giggled like a mad man as he landed on the floor.

I looked about the room, taking in what was about me. That is that's when I glimpsed myself in the mirror. I noticed my reflection had something wrong with it. I just couldn't put my finger on it. I stepped closer to the mirror to see better.

"Eh?" I asked and looked closer. "Whaaaahhhhhh!" I screamed and my hand shot up to my head. "I have cat ears and my hair changed colors!"

And true enough I had two cat ears a little higher on my head than my regular ears were. They were black with blue and purple stripes on them.  The insides of them there an ashy, pink color. My hair had turned a base color black with streaks of blue and purple throughout too. I tugged on one ear and found out that it was truly attached.  I pulled of a few strands of my hair only to find out that it was my real hair.

"That's so cool," GIR said with a giggle while watching me.

"Cool? It would be if I was not stuck on a spaceship in the middle of space, as a captive, and planning to escape as soon as everyone wakes up!" I said hysterically, breathes coming out like pants.

GIR just shrugged his shoulders and went to a shelf that was on the wall behind us. He pulled of a few things and asked, "Wanna play dress up?"

I turned to look at him and out of the corner of my eye I noticed I had a tail besides just the ears. My eyes grew wider, if that was possible. I jumped when I saw this and caught a glimpse of my feet.  I had dainty looking cat paws replacing the two feet I knew I had before all of this. I sank to the floor in surprise and shock.

"Oooo, you has a tail!" GIR giggled and pulled it.  He wrapped it around his shoulders like a boa.  “Dahling, you shouldn't have.  It's just too much!”

"I am now and officially a true freak of nature!" I cried ignoring him completely. "I swear to god that I will never wish for anything else in my life!  It all turns horribly wrong!" I started to cry, tears running down by cheeks.  They slowed quickly when my newly acquired ears picked up the sound of voices and the steady thunk of footsteps.

"It came from in here? Why would anyone want to be in a clothing storage closet?" a voice asked slightly confused.  “Who would want to steal clothes?”

"I have no clue." Another replied.

"Uh oh." GIR said, hopped up, and ran to the vent.

I scrambled after him as quickly as I could. We got up and were about to go until I remembered that the vent had to be closed. "GIR. I'll lower you down and you get the vent. When I bring you back up you but the vent back on ok?" I asked.

"Kay." He replied and I lowered him down. He picked up the vent and I brought him back up. He replaced it just in time as the door opened.  I slapped my hand over his mouth before he could get us caught. 

“You see anything?” someone asked.

“I don't see a damn thing.  Space is screwing with us big time.”

“Yeah, we need more time off here soon.  With that last pick up of slaves, it's a little too much.  Especially when we really don't have room for them all.”

“At least none of the ones after the two that were put in the cells have shown any weird sort of reactions.”

“True.”

“Come on, let's go grab something to eat.  I've craving something just a bit on the bloody side.”

“You read my mind!”

I let out a silent sigh when I heard their footsteps exit the room and the door slide closed behind them.  I let go of the little robot and followed GIR back to my room. He waved at me and walked back to the vent.  He replaced the cover quietly.  I only hoped he returned directly to his cell.   I shook my head at the thought of him walking elsewhere throughout the ship and just walked back to my bed. I sighed and clambered back into it. Rouk murmured something about creampuffs then fell back into a deep sleep again. I curled up around her and worried about what might happen in the morning.

* * *

 

  
****Next Morning….** **

* * *

"Get down now." Rachel half growled half demanded. She had her notebook in her hand.

"No." I said with a blanket covering my head and it was wrapped around me like a cocoon.  I sorta looked like a baby kangaroo in its mother's pouch.

"Why?" she asked again fuming at my delay.

"Because I...I don't want to!"

"Wren, I am losing my patients and I'm losing it fast." Rachel growled at me. “Get your ass out of that bunk now.”

"What is wrong with your puny human-worm friend?" Zim asked yawning running a hand over one of his antenna. Apparently Rachel and I had woken everyone around us up with our fighting.

"She refuses to come down from the top bunk." Rachel replied glaring at me, her foot was tapping on the floor with annoyance.  Her arms were crossed over her chest and inpatients was etched on her face and within her form.

"Why?" Zim asked curiously crossing his cell to lean against the bars with his shoulder, arms crossed across his chest.

"If I knew I would tell you, now wouldn't I?" Rachel turned to Zim snapping sharply. She turned back to me and pointed to the floor, "Down. Now." She demanded.

I shook my head.

"Just get down Wren," Zim said rolling his eyes.

"NO!" I shouted.

"Will you get down if you can take the blanket with you?" Rachel asked.

"Maybe," I replied hesitating just a little bit.  I was unsure if I could get down without showing my feet.

"And then will you tell me or show me what's wrong?"

"Only if we talk about it in the bathroom." I said.  I knew it wouldn't offer absolute solitude from everything and everyone in the hall but it was something.

"Fine." She replied and headed that direction without looking back at me.

I got down carefully as not to show my feet or tail and headed after Rachel. Zim shook his head and sighed, "I will never understand humans, especially the females."

I stopped behind the wall separating the bathroom from everything, my back to the wall.

"Ok. Now what is wrong with you?" she asked.

"Well, you remember that injection they gave us?"

"Yeah, how can someone forget about that?"

"Well I didn't die but I think I had an allergic reaction to it."

"What sorta 'allergic reaction' are we talking about? Are you covered in hives? Did you grow a tail or something?"

"Umm, something like that." I replied not looking her in the eye.

"Well...?  Are you going to show me or not?"

"I sorta," I started to say but then I just dropped the blanket. I looked down like a small child that had just gotten in trouble. My ears were tilted back and my tail twitched in anticipation.  My fingers knotted themselves together with my nervousness. Rachel was silent for several minutes. Then she suddenly busted out laughing. She fell to the floor holding her sides.

"It is not funny!" I shouted and stomped my foot.

"It is so," Rachel gasped. "You're a Neko!" and she fell into another fit of laughter.

I growled, ears flat against my skull, the pupils of my eyes contracted, and tail twitching this time in anger. I stomped out from behind the wall.

Zim saw me and busted out laughing too. I glared daggers at him and he stopped with only a few snickers escaping.

A guard was passing by. He stopped and looked at Zim perplexed. He turned around and gaped at me. He then turned around and ran down the corridor.

"Well that is something I would have never expected." Rachel said, wiping tears away from her face.

"Me either," added Zim. He had started laughing again and he was wiping tears away from his face also.  “I've seen several ridiculous things in my life and you have to be one of them!”

I sat down on the floor in the corner of our cell with my knees up to my chest. I buried my face into my arms and sat there. Rouk came up and nuzzled my ear.  That hurt.  Here I was freaking out because I wasn't human anymore and the two of them were making fun of me.  This wasn't normal.  It shouldn't have even happened!  Would I become less and less myself and more and more feline?

I was suddenly shaken out of my desperate thoughts by a dozen scientists busted into the cell. One rushed up to me and grabbed me around the waist yanking me off the floor roughly.

"Wha..? Hey let go of me!" I shouted and struggled in its grip.  My fingers dug into his arm sharply and he growled at me.

"Let go of her!" Rachel shouted and launched herself at the creature only to be caught by two others. She kicked one of them.

The scientists forced me down onto a cot and strapped me to it. One brought out a needle from somewhere in the folds of his clothes and injected me with it. I freaked and struggled as hard as I could to get away but the liquid soon made me sleepy.  I loss all control as the world started to fade and grey around the edges.

"What did you do to her!" Rachel shouted struggling harder watching me stop struggling almost immediately. "Let go of me! What did you do to her!"

The cot started to moving and the last thing I remember was hearing Zim say, "I guess we have to rethink the plan." I then became good friends with the shadows that were creeping into my vision.  They caressed my consciousness with a delicate hand and beckoned for me to just give in to their whispering temptations.  I was out before I got out of earshot of Rachel's shouts.


	9. Rachel to the Rescue!

**Chapter 9—Rachel to the Rescue!—**

* * *

 

**Rachel's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

I glared at the scientists who were restraining me as the others left with Wren. On was holding its arm a peculiar way.  The other was walking a little oddly and grimaced every time he took a step.

_“At least I got a few good punches in,”_ I thought to myself while I fumed rubbing my knuckles where I punched someone in the midst of the fight.  The skin was broken over my knuckles and I smeared blood across the back of my hand not really thinking of the pain at the moment.

I had heard Zim say earlier when Wren was being taken away, "I guess we have to rethink the plan." I turned my attention fully to Zim and glared at him ready to give him the tongue lashing of the century. I shook my head angrily thinking it wouldn’t bring Wren back, gritting my teeth and said, "No. We keep the plan."

"What!" Zim asked shocked. Rouk glared and growled at me.

"We are going ahead with the plan." I repeated. "Wren gave us our diversion, even though unexpected, and now we must take that chance."

Zim looked at me in disbelief. "You are just leaving her here?" he asked. "She is your best friend and you’re leaving her! I refuse to believe that!"

"Why do you care!" I shouted to at him pointing an accusing finger his way. "Remember, you don't need friends. I quote and I mean quote, 'Irken Invaders do not need friends.' So I ask again, why do you care!" I practically screamed with that last statement.

Zim looked shocked and then cast his eyes down in shame. "Sorry." He whispered resting his head against the bars.

It was my turn to look shocked. _'Wren might have mentioned something to me once that he would never say anything like that._ ' I thought to myself leaning my head against the bars as well.  I closed my eyes and breathed through my nose to calm my nerves.

"No." I said after a long string of silence, "I should be the one to say sorry. I really have never blown up like that. It's just that…Wren would have…she would have tried harder to save me and I barely hurt them in trying to save her." I sunk to the floor and put my head in my hands, fingers gripping my hair roughly.

Zim sat on the floor too, his ruby eyes toward the ground still. "You at least have a friend to fight for." He replied. He looked at me and glared, "I have no one close enough to me to even call a friend except for GIR, but he’s not quite the living, breathing, bleeding type of friend. That is all I really wanted really instead of taking a mission to invade. I just wanted to belong and prove myself to my Tallests and the rest of the Empire.  Wanted to prove that I was not a joke."

"Well that's your fault isn't it?" I asked with the a glare as I looked up at him.

Zim glared at me and shook his head, "You know, I had none until now."

"And what are you getting at?" I asked with a blank expression on my face.

"My Tallest, the leaders of all Irkens, never really want me at all and who would. I basically destroyed half of our planet Irk and I'm the shortest Irken on and off of Irk." He physically winced at that and I could tell it was true. "And when I was sent off to Earth in this sector, I knew they didn't want me around. I'm not as stupid as people think I am.  I can take a hint.  I’ve had a lot of time to think about all this."

"You know. You are actually a little bit taller than Wren is when you stand directly next to her when she isn't slouching and she really isn't the tallest person on Earth. You should see Andy. I think he is about six foot three. But anyway, why are you telling me about this?" I asked.

"I dunno really. But when I was in here and saw you and Wren being brought in, I personally thought that you two would kill each other. And maybe if one of you killed the other I could get your help to escape and I wouldn't have to worry about anything." He replied with a shrug.

"K..." I replied. "But you're getting our help without one of us killing the other, so basically we are sort of friends. And by the way, Wren and I always act like that. Unless we are really hyper."

"Hyper?" he asked questioningly while raising a nonexistent eyebrow.

"You really don't want to know." I replied with a small smile. I stood up and clasped the bars of the cell. "Listen Zim. We might want to break out now while the guard is away."

"But how?" he asked standing up too.  He motioned down the hall that Wren was taken down. “Part of our plan was taken and literally went out the door.”

"I know!" GIR squealed happily catching our attention.

"Huh?" Zim and I asked at the same time looking at the insane little robot.

"I know a way out!" he giggled happily. "I get out all the time!"

"Why didn't you ever tell me this before!" Zim growled at the unit.  He seemed to be restraining himself from snatching the little robot up and shaking it till it’s bolts rattled.

"I dunno." he replied with a shrug.

"How did you get out GIR?" Zim asked sighing massaging his temples.

"Through the vents," He replied. He walked to the wall and pulled off the wall panel. Behind it was a black void of the vent's opening.

"Wow." I muttered. "The things you learn from a little robot without a true and single thought in his head."

* * *

 

**Several minutes later….**

* * *

 

An alarm was going off.  It was muffled but I could hear it and it was definitely an alarm. ' _So they finally figured out that we're missing_.' I mused from behind GIR. Zim was behind me muttering about something a little off subject but I wasn't quite paying attention to what he was complaining about. I shook my head and continued, though my thoughts wandered.

' _What's happening to Wren_?' I asked myself.

GIR suddenly disappeared and I lost sight of him. I stopped at the intersection and Zim ran into me from behind.

"Watch it!" I growled at him, turning around just so just to glare at him even though it was so dark I really couldn’t see him behind me.

"Why don't you watch it!" he growled back.

"I can't help it that your little 'bot disappeared."

"He what!" Zim exclaimed.

I hissed at him to shut it because we didn’t need anyone hearing us and us getting caught again.

I glanced down the other three vents for the little robot. I was about to ask Zim if he had a light but I saw a little glimmer at the end of the passage in front of us.

"I think I found him." I said and whispered to Rouk. She was hanging in a sling I had created from a torn blanket. "Rouk, can you see him in this gloom?" I asked.

"Why?" Rouk asked wiggling her head out of the sling. She turned her head and looked forward.

"I dunno. You're a bio-mech thingy. You should have something to help somehow," I replied.

"Um, I'll try." she said. It took her awhile and she squirmed out of the sling. "I saw him and then lost him.

"Well, then. Where did he go?" Zim asked.

"Farther down the vent in the middle I think."

"Oh great you think." I replied sarcastically.  “That’s not going to help us if you’re wrong you know.”

"Well, shall we go?" Rouk asked looking like a very odd cat or ferret on all fours with her wings against her back.

"If you get us lost, I swear to god." I started to say.

"What's the point? GIR probably got us lost anyway." Zim said from behind me with a sigh.

"For once I agree. You are most likely right." I replied and headed off after Rouk who was bounding back and forth a little ahead of us.

"I think we should move a little faster. Rouk might run a hole into the floor." Zim said as he looked at her from over my shoulder.

"Zim we are in a vent. There is no floor only the bottom of the vent."

"Just had to get technical didn't you?"

"Yep." I replied and started off down the vent. “I always get technical when I'm right.”

We crawled on a while more and suddenly Rouk stopped, came back, and returned to her sling. She looked at me and pointed in front of her, "Just keep going straight." She said.

We continued and I soon noticed that the sides of the vent widened. Zim for some odd reason moved up and kept pace with me. Then suddenly we both placed our hands in front of us and found there was nothing there. Before we could move both of us slid forward and somersaulted. We landed on our butts and began to slide downwards. Without thinking both of us hugged each other and screamed.

"AHHHHHHHHH!"

"WEEEEEEEEE!" Rouk screamed happily throwing her front paws in the air from her spot in the sling.

We slid for what seemed forever. Through twists, turns, and even maybe a loop.

 The vent spat us out suddenly, throwing us into a blinding light. All of us landed on something soft and metallic smelling. Zim and I noticed that we were hugging each other and screamed. I stood up, brushed myself off, and looked around like nothing happened.  I was not just hugging an alien for dear life and I would never admit that I had done it either if anyone asked.

I noticed quite a lot of big ships around us and that we had landed on a large pile of rags that were surrounded by a good bit of storage containers. A ship had just landed and seven people were coming out of it.  I was hoping that the incoming ship had covered our screams.

"K..." I said. Six out of the seven people were guards, I could tell then as I crept over to hide behind a crate to keep out of sight. The guards were around a single figure in what seemed to be a straightjacket and muzzle. I looked at the figure for a while and noticed he had black hair and a few features that just clicked. ' _He looks familiar for some odd reason. Oh well, it's probably nothing.  How many humans actually look like one another?_ ' I thought and shrugged.

Zim and I got closer and just in time. We saw that the person had rushed and tossed two guards, knocking them out as their skulls collided with the floor by coincidence, and he was trying to go at the other four.

"We have to help him." I whispered to Zim.

"But.... what about the plan?"

I glared at him.

"Fine. I'll help." Zim replied and then added under his breath, "The things that I do for a damn escape.  Unbelievable."

Zim and I crept closer to the guards. A sudden flash of silver caught my eye and I noticed that it was GIR.

"Oh no." Zim muttered as he face palmed.

GIR jumped onto a guard and started to hug him around the neck.  He was screaming something about becoming friends.  The guard's face started to turn blue.

"Now!" I shouted and both of us jumped up and ran at the other guards. I planted a kick in the face of one guard while Zim hit two with his spider legs that had just started to retract into the pod on his back. The scuffle lasted only seconds as the other guards were knocked out cold.  The one GIR had hugged may not even be alive at that moment it didn't matter.  I stepped around the collapsed guards to the person we had just saved and helped him with getting off the floor since his arms were bound.

As I stood at his side and helped him up I got a better look at him. ' _Now he looks really familiar,'_ I thought.

He started to struggle with his bonds until I placed a hand on his back and he stopped struggling, looking at me with a slightly confused look on his face. I undid the clasps on his back and the bands along the muzzle. When I stepped back he tore the jacket and muzzle off along with the bands around his wrists.

"Rachel!" he shouted and hugged me, lifting me off the ground.

I gave a yelp startled but was more than a little surprised when I recognized him fully. I hugged him back giggling like mad.

"Uh…yeah…" Zim coughed and looked away only to see Rouk making faces. He started to snicker at it and then stopped when he noticed me glaring at him.

"Zim this is my boyfriend James," I said giving James another hug.

"Zim?" James asked suspiciously, eying him with a frown.  It was obvious that he didn't trust the Irken as far as he could throw the ship we were on.

"I am only here because of her friend," Zim said stiffly and crossed his arms across his chest drawing himself to his full height.  It wasn't much to James' almost six foot height but it was impressive for Zim.

"Yeah, right..." James replied still frowning.  He looked over at me for a slightly better explanation to the situation.

"Actually he is. Wren made and agreed to a treaty with him.  Rouk and I were included as long as GIR was included on his side.   So he has to be nice to us and help us until he can get out on his own." I stated waving my hands in explanation.

"Oh, so he is Wren's 'friend'?" James asked slyly with an innuendo lace throughout.

I smiled evilly when I caught wind of it and replied, "I dunno... but look how he's blushing."

Zim's cheeks actually started to turn red through his green skin and he cast his head down, a scowl on his face.

"Well I guess that answers my question somewhat." James said shrugging. He turned to me, "So how did you get here?"

I was just about ready to answer him when Zim interrupted us. "Maybe we should find Wren before we get caught. We're standing in plain view in a ship bay which is one of the best ways to get caught.  You two can talk on the way." Zim suggested almost hesitantly.

_'He seems to be afraid of James_.' I mused studying his face. But then I noticed he wasn't quite afraid of James, it was something else.  Something that wasn't quite showing itself at this moment.  I just couldn't put my finger on it because it was like it was screaming at me but I couldn't hear it because it was muffled.

"Why not." I said and shrugged.

Zim sighed with relief and started to the door. James looked toward me for an answer. I shrugged, not able to put an answer to the question. James and I then jogged after Zim to make sure he didn't get lost, hurt, or worse captured.  It wouldn't help any of us if one of us happened to get caught.  We had just escaped.

* * *

 

**Zim’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

I almost gagged at the emotions between the two humans.  I’d heard of the term of romance before this but this was almost unbearable.  Mushy and pointless one part of mind snarled.  The other part wish I had someone who was so excited to see me, to want to even be as close to me as those two were.

I gave a sharp, low exhale.  As if that would ever happen.  Irkens weren’t meant to have so deep of a connection as others did with their relationships.  Our children were birthed from tubes so we could concentrate on invading and taking control.  There was no need to be so intimate as these humans were.

I didn’t expect to ever find anything like they had and I never would.  Right now, escaping was what I worried most about.


	10. Fury of Friends

**Chapter 10—Fury of Friends—**

* * *

 

**Wren's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

I woke up drowsy and with a slight headache again.  I was getting really tired of waking up with a headache all the time.  Twice in two days was a little too much for me.  Not to mention the point that I didn’t know where the hell I was again.  This seemed to be a trend for me.  One I’d really, really like to break.

Groaning I tried to sit up, but couldn't. I started to panic and then remembered where I was and what had happened.  I groaned again and dropped my head back to the table with a thunk.  Wincing I realized that wasn't the best idea seeing as my head started to pound just a little more. 

I tried to lick my lips but only found that my mouth was dry and my lips were chapped. I tried to swallow, but started coughing. _'Great_ ,' I thought, gasping for breath. _'I wake up only to find that I'm worse off than what I was before'_.

After the spaz attack I almost had, I was more than ready to get out of this place. Moving my hand I tried to figure out how it was strapped down. I pulled up and found out that my hand could slip out easily. "Wow. Aren't these aliens intelligent," I muttered hoarsely, wincing as my chapped lips cracked and split painfully.

I released the rest of my limbs after freeing my hands fully and noticed one of the worst things that could happen to a girl. I was on the table with only the sheet covering me and my only clothing was my bra and underwear.

"I swear to God if they have done anything to me," I growled and wrapped the sheet around me as I stood up, using the table for support as my head spun. "Stupid aliens. I'll get them back," I muttered as I tried to find a way out of the room I was in.  Anything in the room became a support as I tried to gather my wits.

When my head started to clear I took a better look at the area.  The walls were solid white and the floor a cold, metallic silver. The only thing that stood out from the room was that there were three black spheres hovering in a triangular formation at one wall. I walked over to the spheres and started to look at them. I could see my reflection in each which  freaked me out just a bit. I looked at my reflection more closely then noticed that my hair was braided back into a very tight and precise braid down the back of my neck and back.

"Wow," I said and noticed that I could see perfectly without my glasses. "Maybe they did fix me up, but is this because of them or what happened to me..." I said and noticed that my ears and tail were still there, "If it was something they did, obviously they can't fix everything."

I studied my features further and noticed yet another thing that had changed. Instead of my regular nose I had a cat's nose. "And I hope they stopped any other changes or that all the changes have finally stopped," I muttered with a sighed poking at my nose.

I went back to studying the spheres before me trying not to think of anything else on me that could have changed.  I poked one sphere and it moved and giggled. Kind of.

 "Huh?" I asked and blinked. It was a solid black ball, yet it had giggled. "How did you do that?" I asked without thinking.

It chirped a few times and the top and bottom turned in two different directions. The other two spheres did the same. They suddenly started to hover around me. Clicking and chirping, they somehow opened a door that they were hovering in front of. All three of them pushed me toward it.

"Whoa! Wait a minute!" I shouted throwing my hands up.

All three stopped and squeaked. I looked out the door and saw no one. I turned to the three spheres and raised an eyebrow. "You can understand me, right?" I asked. They squeaked and all of them twisted their two halves. "I'll take that as a yes then," I said and they made what sounded like really happy chirps. "Great," I muttered running a hand over my hair and twisting my ear slightly. "I'm talking to three alien spheres."

We walked into a bigger room. There was no one in it either. It looked as though it was just deserted. I looked around as if I wanted to find something and then came three questioning squeaks from my companions. "Nothing," I said. "I just want to be able to find something decent to wear that wasn't a sheet."

The leader gave what seemed to be an equivalent to a shrug and hung in the air. I shrugged also and continued to look around. Then there came a huge crash and several bangs from somewhere nearby. A door started to dent that was on one wall. "Uh oh," I muttered and froze unsure what the hell was happening.

* * *

 

**Rachel's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

I had explained everything to James as we snuck through the ship trying to find Wren.  It was everything from our school assembly, to waking up on the ship, to the injections from the scientists/medical teams.  I explained how we got into the cells and how exactly we escaped as well with Wren's unexpected help.  

James also told us how he had been captured. It seems that the aliens just forced the people at his school onto a transport ship. He had dodged the capture only to be surrounded by guards a little later on. One guard had grabbed James. He had twisted out of his grip and taken him down. Basically in the flurry of punches and kicks three guards lay dead, one of them being a captain.  James had escaped easily in the confusion.  But he had been caught again a little while later and then brought up here to be tried for murder. The rest as they say, was history.

I was happy that I finally got to be with James.  We hadn't seen each other for ever because he'd only been able to visit me a couple times.  He had lived so far away it was hard to find time to see each other regularly, especially with school, work, and preparations for college.  But I would have been much happier if it wasn't under the circumstances that had occurred.

' _Wonder if Wren is all right,'_ I thought to myself with a frown. I was so distracted that I accidentally ran into a guard.  The shock of running into some caused me to trip over my own two feet and landed on my butt.   The guard turned around looking about and I looked up at him from the floor. He glanced down and gave a deep guttural growl and I gave a small, nervous wave up at him.

"How did you get out? No… wait…. You are the ones that escaped!" he shouted at us. "Down here! I found them!"

"Oh shit." James and I muttered at the same time as I scrambled off the floor as quickly as I could.

The three of us ran down the corridor to our left. And by now there were a dozen guards hot on our heels from the opposite direction. A door was at the end of the hall and I thought we were trapped for sure. It was a split second that I looked over my shoulder to check to see how far back the guards were.  They weren't too far behind us at the moment which was not good. I turned back around only to notice that Zim had disappeared from in front of us. James and I continued to run, him gripping my hand tightly, until two silver legs grabbed us and pulled us into an alcove in the wall. I started to panic before I saw a flash of ruby red eyes and a grin.

I gave a silent sigh and then recoiled at the sound of several loud bangs and one very loud crash. We looked out of the small alcove only to find that all dozen guards were laid out in front of the door. All of them were out cold.  Seemed luck was on our side at the moment and I thanked god that it was though I wasn’t sure how he pulled this one off.

"Thanks, Zim," giggled Rouk and popped her head out of the opening of the sling that was still hung from my shoulder.

"Whoa, what is that?" James asked distracted from the guards for only a moment.

"I forgot all about Rouk," I answered and pulled her out of the sling. She giggled some more and jumped to my shoulder. She slipped and grabbed both my shoulders firmly with her forepaws. Then she planted her hind paws on the small of my back. She extended her wings fully so that it looked like I had small dragon wings. I shook my head at her antics.

"This, James, is Rouk," I said, pointing to her and she gave him one of Wren's Cheshire cat grins. "She's Wren's muse. At least I think she is.  We really haven’t quite determined what she is to be truthful."

"'Kay…." James replied. "You mean the bio-mech she mentioned in her random rambling?" he added.  “The one from her stories and RPGs?”

"Yep," Rouk replied. She brought up a Siamese hologram and perched herself on my shoulder. "I have a solid hologram projection system that lets me change shapes, retractable blades along my back, fully functional wings, and I can track Wren's every movement."

"You can what!" I exclaimed with a growl.

"I can track Wren. I am her muse you know." She then jumped to Zim's shoulder and changed back.

"Why didn't you tell us that?" I asked, getting angry. GIR hid behind Zim and Zim stood his ground firmly with a scowl planted on his face.

"You never asked," answered Rouk with an indifferent shrug.

"Why you little..." I said and started to go at her.

James put his hand on my shoulder. "Sorry Rachel. You get to kill her later, but now we have to find Wren," he told me. He then leaned over and whispered, "Even though you are adorable when you are angry."

I blushed a deep crimson. Zim looked at me and raised a nonexistent eyebrow. He opened his mouth to say something, but then shut it and shook his head. "I am not asking. Not my business. Let's just find Wren and get out of this stinking pile of raw metal," he said turning to move from the piled unconscious guards.

We all started to turn away and head back down the corridor but stopped all of a sudden when the door behind us started to open. It made shrill scraping sounds and then stopped. We all turned around only to see a shadow in the doorway. "Out of the pan and into the fire," I muttered.

* * *

 

**Wren's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

After the several bangs and a huge crash, I heard a murmur of voices. My three pals went to the door and squeaked in a questioning tone. I walked over to the door and put my ear against it to hear better. I placed my hand on the wall beside me to balance myself. Unwittingly I triggered the panel to open the door and the door started to move with a shrill screech. My three little pals gave a chirp and hid behind me.

"Umm... this might not be good," I muttered, my ears down as I backed away from the door slowly. The door came to a complete stop and three shadows came into view. There were several minutes of silence and no one moved.

Two small shadows started to move, one through the air and one running, both coming toward me. I could see their eyes, one icy blue and the other one a turquoise blue. Suddenly I hit the floor with a thud and something was licking my face and hugging my neck. "Whoa!" I said, giggling trying to get both off.

The one that was licking me stopped. "You're okay!" it said happily.

"Thank god, Wren's okay," the other figured stated.

I cocked my head to the side and finally figured out who the other two shadows were. The third one was a complete mystery. "I'm guessing you found me by dumb luck, Rachel," I called. I stood up and got a closer look at the third person, but before I could ask who it was, Rachel started to laugh.

"Love what you're wearing, Wren. Nice Roman touch there," she said.

I saw Zim avert his eyes and I looked down. I blushed beet red. I was still in the sheet. It was wrapped around my chest still but slowly it was creeping down. I adjusted it carefully, kept a hand on it and glared at Rachel.

"It's not my fault," I snapped. "I'm sorry, but I never planned to be allergic to the stuff. I never planned to change, and I most certainly never frellen planned to be taken away! And who the hell is that person?" I added, getting worked up, tail lashing sharply.

"Wren calm down," Rachel said as she took a step forward holding a tentative hand out towards me.

"Calm down? I am calm Rachel. The only way I'll get calmer is if I fall down dead!" I growled slapping it away.

"Wren, I mean it. Calm down," Rachel soothed again as she raised her hand again and placed a hand on my shoulder.

It didn't work for me. "Rachel, do not start with me," I growled even more and crouched back and down moving away from her touch. "Now is not the time to touch me."

"Why?" she asked, starting to get ticked.

"Everything is bad right now and I am really not in the mood to talk and I have no clothes except for a stinkin' sheet.  I have fucking cat ears, a tail and paws.  Not too long ago I found out I also have a fucking cat nose.  I just don’t need any of this right now!"

"That doesn't mean you have to bite my head off!" she yelled at me.

"If you would not have laughed at me, I would have not been here like this and we would have been long gone by now!" I yelled back.

"But if we would have left earlier, then we would never have helped James!"

"Well if it fucking helped him fine! But what about helping me!  Pushing me away so you can get some tail is fucking pathetic!"

“Excuse me?  What the fuck are you talking about?  I saw someone who needed help and helped them!  I wasn't thinking about anything else but helping them and finding you!”

“Like hell!”

James and Zim were looking warily at us. They were uncertain at how two friends could fight so viciously especially with how worried Rachel was moments before.  They also were not sure exactly how to separate the two if they started beating the crap out of each other without getting hurt themselves.

"Should we break it up?" Zim whispered to James.

"Soon, but not now. Both of them need to release some anger," James replied in a whisper.  “When the claws come out we'll try to break it up.”

"We were helping you! We were coming to find you!" Rachel shouted at me, fists curling at her sides.

"I bet!" I growled back baring my teeth.  “It was probably some fucking dumb luck that you even found me.”

"We were! That's what we were doing!"

"And get yourself caught in the process? Aren't you fucking stupid!" I yelled.

Now, we weren't like those delicate girls who pulled hair and slapped when fighting because Rachel pulled back her fist and let a punch fly. I dodged it by moving to the right and tried to launch myself at her. James grabbed Rachel’s wrist as she drew back to throw another punch and looped an arm around her waist to stop her from launching that punch. Zim grabbed my waist and pulled me away from Rachel. Even though he looked weak, he was pretty strong and I struggled my ass off but he kept me detained.

"Let me go!" I snarled and struggled even more in Zim's grip.  I strained in his grip and reached out as if to claw at Rachel.

"Let go, James!" Rachel growled trying to get at me.

"Rachel, our first priority is to get out of here. You don't want to die young do you?” James said and Rachel paused, only briefly.  “I didn't think so. You and Wren can duel it out on the escape ship if we get there," James said in a calming voice.

"Fine," Rachel answered and relaxed in his grip.

"Grrr." I growled and calmed down enough until Zim let go. My tail continued to twitch with frustration. I turned to Zim and glared at him. He just glared right back at me.

"I'm keeping my part of the truce.  If you kill Rachel, technically our truce would end," he said, "And James is right. Our first priority is to escape and not die trying."

I sighed, deflating a little and nodded. "Let's get out of here," I muttered.

"Fine. We'll get out of here and then talk about why we were fighting later," Rachel answered, agreeing.

"Good. Now that that cat fight is cooled for a while, no pun intended," James said looking my way. I waved it off muttering a 'Don't worry about it.' "Let’s go back to the cargo bay and grab a good ship," James declared.

I never moved an inch. I had other thoughts on my mind. The three spheres had helped me and I didn't want them to get destroyed. "Wait," I called and everyone stopped and looked at me. "We can't go yet."

"Why?" Rachel asked, starting to get angry again.

"Because, we have to take something with us," I replied.

"What is it?" James asked.

"It's more like they."

Zim raised an eyebrow and asked, "They?"

The three spheres hovered in around me. The one gave a small squeak and all three hid behind me. "It could be a trap," cautioned James, eying them warily.

"If they are, then you can blame me," I retorted. "They listen to me and I can somewhat understand them too."

"Wren." Rachel growled.

"But... They helped me!"

"Whatever. If they follow us I really don't care. I just want to get out of here,” she turned around and stalked off down the hall.

“Fine,” I grumbled under my breath.

James sighed as he ran a hand through his hair.  He followed after Rachel without a word. 

Zim looked at me a moment longer before following, Rouk on his shoulder.  She glanced at me with a small look of worry and I sent a wave of calm thoughts toward her.  She shifted but stayed on Zim's shoulder.

I looked at the spheres around me.  I laid a hand on one gently and brushed a thumb over its surface.  Another bumped my cheek softly.  The last hummed softly from above me.  A feeling of calm washed over me and I gave a slight smile.  The feeling from them was a slight sense of being and knowing things would work out. 

Without letting my three companions get too far ahead of me I gave a slight snort but jogged a little to catch them while trying to keep a sheet around me.  As soon as we found a ship I was finding real clothing that actually fit.  Or at least stayed on.


	11. Blood's First Fight

**Chapter 11—Blood’s First Fight—**

* * *

 

**Rachel's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

We headed down the hall back toward the cargo bay that we saved James in. I was still pissed at Wren and personally I thought I was in full right to be pissed. She was taking all her anger out on me and I didn't need it. She had changed my mood totally and I really wasn’t happy about the sudden change in her. At least I had James there to comfort me. Right now he was holding my hand and giving me comforting looks every now and then. Once we got a ship and escaped, I was going to ask Wren just exactly what her problem was.

I stepped through the cargo bay doors and stopped suddenly enough that Wren ran into the back of my and James jerked back. Two dozen guards were standing there, talking.  All of them looked at us with mild surprise.

"Here we go again." I muttered.

"Get them!" one guard shouted pointing at us and the rest charged at us.

I let go of James' hand quickly and shifted to the side as one threw a punch at me and missed. He hit the wall instead with a yelp. Another one brought his blade at my face and I ducked. The sword still ended up slicing a few pieces of my hair off. "Oh geez!" I said and scrambled to the side as the blade came down once more. I didn't let him recover and kicked him in the groin. His sword fell to the floor and I kicked it away. I then kicked him in the face and knocked him out cold. As soon I had finished him off, another guard took his place.

* * *

 

**Wren's P.O.V….**

* * *

 

There were guards in the bay.  I watched as Zim dodged to the side to avoid getting nailed with a kick.  He danced out of the way with a practiced grace that I could only envy.

My attention shifted as quick as a heartbeat to a guard that was in front of me.  I groaned and dodged a punch. Everyone was in battle, but as soon as one guard was out, another one took its place.

"Man don't you guys ever give up?" I muttered and dodged yet another punch. I threw my own punch and heard a crack as I broke the woman's nose. I then kicked the side of her head and she went down.

A small part of me was wondering how I was able to do all this when I’ve never fought anyone in my life.  My bark is worse than my bite and this was kind of freaking me out as I slid between the legs of another guard.  I leapt up only to have two other guards take her spot and I groaned again. I backed up to dodge their punches and backed up into someone. I turned my head and saw that it was James. "Sorry about earlier," I said and deflected a double punch somehow.  Dumb luck seemed to be on my side at the moment.

"That's okay. Everyone was just a bit too tense.  Stuck on a slave ship in space can do that to people," he replied and blocked a flying kick to the head.

"Question. If they have weapons, why don't the use them?" I asked him.

"I have no clue," he answered and moved away. “But, do you really want to jinx us?”

I heard a clang of metal on metal and heard the shrill sound of something skidding across the floor. I looked down and saw a sword at my feet. Apparently James had one too. "Ironic, isn't it?" I asked.

"This is gonna be good," he replied ducking while picking up the weapon, an evil smirk crossing his face.

I smiled as well. I looked up and saw that the two guards had seen the blade on the floor too. They went for it, but I slammed my pawed foot on the flat of the blade and it flipped into the air. I caught the hilt on the second flip and flashed it at the guards while crouching into a very cliché martial arts move you see on those old 70’s movies. "Come and attack me. But I warn you, kitty's not in a nice mood. And when kitty's not in a nice mood, things get ugly, very ugly, very fast."

"Oh look. She has a sword. Do you know how to use it, kitten?" one asked with a sneer.

"You'd better hand that over to us, kitten. You might hurt yourself on it if you don’t," the other added with a chuckle lightly nudging the other guard with an elbow in jest.

Something snapped in my head and I snarled fiercely.  Anger boiled over causing my vision to go red.

"And you," I started and swung the blade. It sliced the air. I only saw it enter the one side and come out on the other side of the guard's neck. "Might just lose your head. And never call me kitten.  You don't have that honor."

The second guard looked at his companion and watched his buddy's head roll off his neck. "How? Wha?" he asked startled someone like me had accomplished that feat.

"I am your worst nightmare," I answered, grinning evilly the pupils of my eyes dilating and contracting sharply. The guard looked from me to James who was already slicing his second enemy apart.  I followed his gaze for a second then looked back at him. "Except for him. Now he may be the ultimate nightmare, but you get him if you get past me." He looked shocked and started to inch away as I snarled and gave a hiss. I didn't let him get too far. He fell to the floor in a puddle of his own blood, eyes lifeless and gazing at the ceiling.

I turned and saw Rachel fighting off someone. I also saw James helping her so I shrugged and blocked a blow with my sword without really recognizing my enemy.  My vision began to grow hazier and everything sort of blurred together.  The guard who had thrown it got a good chunk taken out of his arm. Then he saw that there was blood dripping from the blade down to the hilt and down to my hands.  It was splattered all over the front of the sheet I was wearing and a smear across one cheek.  My tail lashed furiously and a snarl graced my lips. Then he looked around at his beheaded comrades. He glared at me and struck again, this time getting a chunk taken out of his other arm. He backed away and soon we were both in a fast paced dual. He was no match though, and as his head turned to my left, the blade followed it and his head fell from his shoulders. It landed with a squishy thunk on the floor.

The sound of the battle around me quieted down as I took out one last guard with a fury I didn't even know I had.  I grinned with demonic pleasure. The cloth swirled about me as I turned around. The body fell backwards, headless.

I turned to Rachel, James and Zim. They were staring at me in disbelief.

Then reality snapped back around me.  My vision becoming clear again and startling crisp.  The smell of blood hung heavily in the air getting stuck in my throat as I tried to get air into my heaving lungs.

“ _Whoa,”_ I thought blinking, looking at the sword in my hand, “ _What the hell just happened? **”**_ I looked about me a little confused as time seemed to rush to catch up with me like someone hit rewind the fast forward.  I looked down and saw I was standing in a pool of blood. Dropping the weapon in my hand I took a few steps backwards almost covering my mouth with my hands until I realized they were stained with the red, viscous liquid as well. My usual black, blue, and purple pawed feet were dark shades of a gruesome red. The front of the sheet I was wrapped in was stained and covered with blood as well as my hands where the blood had dripped down the blade and hilt to cover my fingers.

I staggered backwards a few more steps before I tried turning.  I got wrapped up in the sheet and fell onto my hands and knees in the blood that pooled on the floor.   It acted as a ghastly mirror as I saw my reflection and the blood smeared across one cheek and splattered like freckles across the rest of my face.

' _I never thought I could kill like that. It felt so good but... I lost myself to the fight. Why did I do that?  Why did I let the haze of battle claim me?  James did the same thing, yet he had a reason. He did it for Rachel, his love, for their lives, but I didn't have a purpose. I cared nothing about my life. I did it for the pleasure of killing toward the end. The pleasure of killing_... _Will it happen again?_ ' I felt numb and remembered the vacant look in the eyes of the dead. I shuddered and sat there, not feeling anything.  Willing myself not to feel anything.  Not feeling anything was better than feeling the sick glee that raged inside me during the battle.

Zim, Rachel, James, and Rouk crept over to me unsure how I’d react.  They didn’t want to spook me into attacking them by accident.  Gingerly Rouk dropped to the floor and slowly leapt to my shoulder. She draped herself over my shoulders and gave a soft, sad, knowing coo in my ear. I slowly looked up to everyone, fearful of what they thought of me after seeing everything. 

The only look that Zim gave me a look that said everything. In that brief look he conveyed so much.  Eyes as haunted as I expected mine looked at the moment. 

Rachel and James ignored the blood around me and the blood that covered me.  They each took an arm and helped me up taking most of my weight between them.

"Rachel, why don't you go and find us a ship. Zim can help me with her," James said as he slid an arm around my waist. Rachel gave him a puzzled look. "Go," was all he said, “Please.  We'll try to clean her up a little while you find a ship.”

Rachel turned and moved off farther into the hanger, a little put out by what James said. Zim came to my side to replace Rachel. He put an arm around my back while James kept an arm around my waist. I shivered a little, but walked with them when they moved. 

The only way James could follow Rachel deeper into the bowels of the blasted slave ship was the tracks she left from the blood on the soles of her shoes. We followed Rachel's bloody shoe print tracks deep into the cargo bay and away from the field of death that was behind us.

* * *

 

**Zim’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

The look in her eyes said everything as she gazed up at us from the floor.  Tears were gathering in the corners of those terror filled grey eyes.  I knew exactly how she felt at this moment when I had to kill my first enemy to survive.  The bright, fire lit eyes that I had slightly admired when they were placed in the cage across from me dimmed as she gazed up at us.

She tensed only slightly as Rachel and James lifted Wren into standing.  She hardly noticed when Rachel went off and when I took her place.  And for the first time, I realized how much she had changed from just yesterday.  Lithe, willowy now, where yesterday she was a bit more solid in a bulky way.  Like all humans seemed to be.  

I found that I was actually worried about this poor female as we followed Rachel’s bloody footprints further into the depths of the slave ship’s bay.  The two humans had not been made for space.  Humans seemed to be a young race and would have probably done well without all the stress of because enslaved.  Add to that the stress of a physical change and it was no wonder there was a lost look in the girl’s eyes.


	12. Shiney! Shiney!

**Chapter 12--Shiny! Shiny!—**

* * *

 

**Rachel’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

I started to walk away, well stalk away.  I was a little frustrated because a little part of me was still pissed at even after all this.  “ _Why in the world would James make me look for a ship? He could have probably picked a better one than me. I have no clue what I'm fucking looking for.  Maybe he didn’t trust Zim. Oh well. I really don’t trust him much either to be truthful,”_ I thought to myself frowning.

I stopped to see what the ships looked like around me.  There were all sorts of shapes and sizes around me and several looked very beat up. Several looked way too small for our little group.  Many were too damaged to even make me feel comfortable about stepping onto even the ramp of them. 

One though, just one, caught my eye. It was huge and of an ethereal silver coloring.  It looked like it had no seams and like it had been molded from mercury.  The ship had an odd shape though. I thought it looked a little like something that I had seen before, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I shrugged it off and walked toward it planning on try to see just how big this thing was on the outside.

Before I even got twenty feet away from it a squeak startled me and I jumped. A black ball hovered in front of my face, scaring me again. "Don’t do that!" I growled.

It gave a chirp that sounded sad. It started to hover away. "Sorry," I said and it stopped. "I didn’t mean to growl at you. I just don’t like to be scared or surprised.  We've had enough scares as it is lately."

It gave a few small clicks and a chirp. That seemed to be a sorry also. I reached out and petted it. It gave a happy squeak and started to shake.  The outer shell cracked in several places.  Pieces started to shift and moved and started to change shape.

"I think I broke it," I said and stepped backwards.  Unsure if it was going to explode at this point or not.

Several pieces slid around on the small sphere. They rearranged for a little while and then stopped. I watched as it hung there for a few seconds in the air.  But I squeaked when it fell to the floor, in the shape of a black oval instead of a circle.

"Rachel what happened?" James asked as he turned the corner alone.

"One of Wren’s floating black ball friend’s scared the crap out of me. I snapped at it, said sorry and touched it. It started to change and then stopped and fell to the floor in the shape of an egg. I did not do it." I stated rushed, not moving and still looking at the oval before me.

"I believe you," James said with a small laugh as he took my hand. "But I think it is moving again. Look."

I turned back around to see that the egg shape was shivering. I leaned over to get a closer look and it cracked. "Whoa!" I yelped and fell backwards. James caught me and steadied me. We watched the egg hatch. It cracked more and a piece fell off. A foot with three claws pushed its way out.

Five minutes later it was out of its egg type thing. It shook its head and fell down. It seemed to be a little metal oriental dragon. It was a little smaller than Rouk, but a lot longer than she was. It blinked at me, blue eyes dancing with laughter at the shock I seemed to be in.

"That is really not right," I commented as I bent over to pet it. Chirping and turning its head, it watched me. I scratched it under its chin and it started to purr and closed its eyes.

"Rachel, we need to find a ship before more guards come. I don’t think that another attack is good for either of both parties," James said.

"I know. I was looking at a ship. It might fit all four of us. No, wait. Zim are you going to go with us?" I asked, knowing he had turned the corner with Wren because of their footsteps.  I looked at him from over my shoulder curiously as he held onto Wren.  She had rested her head on his shoulder lightly and was gazing at the floor eyes dead and hollow.

He shrugged his shoulders as best he could. "What is the point of going anywhere else?  I'm pretty sure they destroyed my ship.  The Empire really doesn’t want me either.  That's how I got caught in the first place. Where else am I going to go?  And at this rate I thought you would have insisted so you can drive me madder than I already am."

"Oooo. That is an idea," I grinned mischievously.

"So are you going with us? Fine by me," James said with an indifferent shrug.

"For some reason, I feel like I have made a mistake," Zim frowned and shook his head.

"Okay. Well, back to the ship. It is the one right in front of us." I gestured behind me. "It looks familiar to me but I don’t know. It basically caught my eye because it was big and shiny."

James and Zim shook their heads at me, then looked at the ship. "Let’s just see if it works," James stated and started toward it.

I started to turn around and saw the little dragon watching me. It gave a chirp and giggled. I looked at it funny because I wasn’t sure how something could giggle like that. Giving me a hard look and placing all four feet on the floor firmly, it gave me a series of chirps, squeaks, and growls. It looked as though it was scolding me.

"Fine, fine," I said while bending down and holding out my hand to it. It jumped and landed on my arm and hand. "There, happy now?" I asked. It gave a little chirp of contentment and placed its head on my fingers, beginning to fall asleep. "Oy," I muttered and pulled it to my stomach, heading off after the others.

I turned a corner to see that James had left Wren with Zim, who was still keeping her standing.  He was looking off toward the ship a little warily _._ I frowned and came up beside him. "Where did James go?" I asked. Zim jumped and glared at me.

"He went to see how big that ship really is and even if it is a ship at all," Zim replied. "I’m doing what he told me to do.  And don't startle me like that."

"Oh.  If you would have been paying attention, I wouldn't have startled you," I hummed noncommittally.

A few minutes later, James appeared from the side of the ship. He was grinning happily. "This is a nice ship. No damage from what I can see on the outside except for a few dull areas, but it will hold just fine. At least I think it will.  I’m no expert but I have a good feeling about this ship. We need to find a way inside though. I saw no door whatsoever."

"Try the panel on the side," Wren murmured softly.

"Wha?" we all asked unsure we had even heard her at all.

* * *

 

**Wren’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

"There should be a panel on this side of the ship," I again answered, but a little louder. I roused myself enough to move forward and Zim followed me, arm still around my waist though I wasn’t sure why. I had no clue why I stepped to the side of the ship and looked at it. I knew I was right though. This was a ship that I thought had only existed in my imagination but here it was.  It was sitting as real as the arm around my waist and as real as everything had been the past couple of days which I only wanted to forget now.

Placing my hand on the panel in front of me, I put pressure on my index finger, pinkie, and the heal of my palm. A light appeared around the panel and clicks were heard from inside the walls of the ship. The door opened with a small whoosh and released a gush of stale air.  I covered my nose and mouth at the smell that was released but watched as a ramp extended toward the ground from the door that was three feet off of the ground.

"Wren, how did you know how to open the ship?" Rachel asked warily.

I didn’t answer. I bit my bottom lip to remain silent again because what was the point?   Personally I wasn't sure if they would believe me if I told them I had seen this ship in my dreams for years.  Where I could almost feel and hear the humming of the engines and the presence of the ship’s consciousness.  That comforting feeling in the back of my mind, always there and always calming.

 "Wren, since you opened the ship, is there anyone or anything inside?" James asked.

I turned to him and shook my head. "The air is really stale. That shows that nothing has been in there for a while."

"And you know that for sure… how?" Rachel asked.

"The power to open the door is on its own mechanism. When the door is open, it is supposed to connect a circuit to turn on the main power supply to light the hall which shows all of the power on the ship is on. No main power, no way to recycle air. No recycled air is bad news. The lights should have been on constantly.  But they are not so that's also a sign that the main power supply needs restarted.  Anyway…" I trailed off.

"This ship looks like it was brought in, never opened, and no power on for several months or even years," Zim suggested. He looked over to me. I nodded to confirm what he said was probably true.

"Oh," James said with a nod. "But how do you know how this thing works?"

I didn’t reply again but bit my lip lightly again.  I gave a slight shrug of my shoulders.

"You can tell us later," Rachel said and walked up beside James. "But are you sure that it is safe to use?"

"Umm… Before we start to go, the core might need looked over and rebooted, but I really don’t know for sure," I commented running a hand lightly along the side of the ship disappointed I couldn’t feel anything like I did in my dreams.

"Oy.." Rachel groaned.

"Well, Wren, could you take us to the helm? Then you could tell us what needs to be done," James said.

I nodded before sliding out of Zim's grip.  I slid my hand into his, as if he were a life line or the courage that I was lacking at the moment, before heading inside the ship. My eyes adjusted quickly to the darkness that permeated the inside of the ship. A soft blue light started to glow from behind me. I turned to see GIR’s eyes giving off the light and lighting the way for a few feet in front of us.

"We are going to have to take the stairs since the main power is down. Rouk, a little light please?" I asked her. I knew that Rachel and James couldn’t see as well as I could in the darkness.  I wasn’t sure about Zim. I looked back and saw that Rachel had locked hands with James to keep from being separated from him in the pitch black.

Rouk’s tail split at the tip. The light that it gave off lit the area and showing dust and a single set of footprints upon the floor. "I thought no one has been in here," said Rachel a bit shakily and she stepped closer to James.

"No, someone has been in here, but it has been quite a long time. See?" I replied and bent down only to cake two fingers with more dust as I swiped them through the footprints. "Dust has already settled into these prints."

"Oh," Rachel muttered. "But that still does not mean that the maker of those prints isn’t still here."

"They’d be dead if they were," I replied. "There would have been too much of a bad air build up without any filtering.” 

“Then are we safe in here with the air?”

“We should be, the door is connected to an air sensor and has a small filtration system set up if too much bad air is recognized.  It almost instantly switches on when the door opens and the senor is set off.”

“Now we need to head to the helm before anyone comes looking for us. This way." I moved to my right. "The helm will be in the head."

"The head?" Zim asked, still beside me.

"I’ll explain everything later. Right now though I wish I had more light," I said.

The other two spheres, which had followed us, flew ahead. Small ports opened on their outsides and light illuminated the area even more. "Thanks my friends," I said and patted both of them. Each gave a happy squeak and chirp and continued to hover in front of me as I walked.

Continuing on, I started to hear whispers from behind me. I could hear Rachel’s and James’ voices. I knew what they were saying. My ears swiveled to catch what they were saying easily and they slowly flattened to my skull and I kept the pain of what they were saying to myself.

* * *

 

**Rachel’s P.O.V….**

* * *

 

' _How did she know how to open it?'_ I thought to myself as we followed her. ' _What did they do to her when they took her?'_

Wren had known how to open the ship. That confused me a lot. But I did remember at some point in time Wren talking about a ship almost like this one.   I thought to myself as we followed her. ' _Is this really something that they could have done to her though?  Especially if I remember her mentioning something like this before.'_

James nudged my shoulder with his and gave me a questioning glance. He seemed to know what I was thinking. "How did she know how to open the ship?" James asked me in a very, very low whisper.

"Just what I was wondering," I replied back in a whisper that was just as low. "But I don’t know what they did to her when they took her. And it was all my fault that they did," I added, looking at the ground.  “But there's a chance that it's not something that they did though.  I just don't know anymore.”

"Rachel, there’s nothing you can do about that. It’s in the past and you should let it be. After all, do you think you would have found me if it had never happened?"

"No… but still."

James pulled me closer to him. "But nothing. We’ll just keep an eye on her okay?"

"Yeah, but I don’t know what to do if she was affected by whatever was done to her."

"We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it," James replied and hugged me close to him.

"I guess we will," I answered and continued to follow the light beams.

Soon we came to what seemed to be a dead end. Wren placed her hand on a panel on the wall and the whole thing slid up. Inside was black nothingness.

"Wren…" I started to ask.

"Yes, Rachel. I know what I am doing.  We were going to take the stairs but this lift runs on its own power like the door. It will take us to the bridge. It will be much much faster than the stairs. Or would you rather take the stairs?  I’m sure the guards would appreciate our consideration when they finally come after us," she said not even looking at me. 

"I trust you, but only because I don’t want to take the stairs," I replied with a sigh.  “Or get caught.”

"Good," she said and stepped into the area. Zim sighed and followed her because she still had a hold of his hand. We followed both of them into the spot with room to spare. Wren let go of Zim's hand and had sat down and pulled a panel off of the wall.

"I thought you said this lift has its own power?" commented Zim looking about the space.

"It does. But you have to do it manually first," Wren explained and twisted two wires together and touched a third to the two. The lift started to move with a jolt. "But once you know which cords then it is pretty simple." Then she shrugged.

"Can you stop it is the only question?" asked James.

"Yes. I just separate the cords. Like now." Wren then pulled them apart and everything stopped.

The door opened and revealed a black void.  Personally I was getting really tired of black voids.  Nothing good ever seemed to come from them. The two spheres hovered out and lit the room, but only to an extent.

"This place is bigger than I first thought," muttered Wren, speaking her thoughts aloud looking about the room as well as she could while leaning out the door.

"Huh?" we all asked.

"Oh sorry. I was just saying that the helm was bigger than I first thought. The helm is probably at an an-…" Wren trailed off there as she tested the floor with a foot and was cut off because she lost her grip on the door frame.  We watched as her eyes grew wide as she started to slide.

“Wren!” I yelped and reached out to try and grab her before she slid too far out of my reach. My fingers brushed the palm of her hand but slipped away as fast as I had touched her hand.  James grabbed me by the waist trying to keep me from following after her into the darkness.


End file.
